
aassI )Ta/7 

BookJ^7___ 



PRESENTED BY 



TEN YEARS 
OF 5ECRET 

NHEEDED 
7ARNING. 



IFTH 
EDITION 







iY 

•D-MOREL 




Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy 



/ 

/ 



"n 



First EoitlON March, 1915. 

Second Edition May, 1915. 

Third Edition ,.........':.:...... September, 1915. 

Fourth Edition December, 1916. 

Fifth Edition July, i9i8. 



Ten Years of 
Secret Diplomacy 

AN UNHEEDED WARNING 

{Being a Reprint of "Morocco in Diplomacy ") 

London : Smith. Elder & Co, 1912. 



E. D. MOREL 

Autnor of "Affairs of West Africa," " The British Case in 

French Congo," "King Leopold's Rule in Africa," "Red 

Rubber," "Great Britain and the Congo," "Nigeria: its 

Peoples and its Problems," etc. 



With Five Maps 



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PUBLICATIONS BY THE SAME AUTHOR 

BOOKS 

Truth and the War 

London: National Labour Press: Third Edition: 
Price 2/6. 

"I am rery much concerned about Mr. Morel. I have read 
his book with considerable disagreement, with a conviction 
that he is a perfectly honest as well as a very able man, but 
above all with a growing apprehension. I am afraid lest, in 
an essential point of his criticism, Mr. Morel will be proved 
to be right.—" H.W. M." in The Nation. 



Africa and the Peace of Europe 



London: National Labour Press: Price 2/- 
" Mr. Morel has never written better. His constructive 
proposals have a large sweep, but they are nowhere Utopian 
and to them or to something very near them every mind, I 
believe, will come which studies the problem of Africa in its 
bearings on European Peace.''— Mr. H. N. Brailsford in 
The Herald. 

Nigeria: Its Peoples and its Problems 

London : Smith Elder & Co. : Two Editions, 1911-12 
" There have been few travellers, indeed, who have given us so 
accurate a picture of the great African region, or who have dis- 
cussed the problems arising from it with so much sound sense 
and sympathy."— The Nation. 
" A fascinating book."— Public Opinion. 

Red Rubber : The Story of the Rubber Slave 
Trade in the Congo 

T. Fisher Unwin : Five Editions, 1906-08 
" If there are any who are not yet believers in the reality of 
the Congo Government's misdeeds, Mr. Morel's new book may be 
recommended as a certain means of conviction. To the author, 
more than to any man ahve, is due the ventilation of this crime 
against civilisation. He has fought a long uphill battle against 
apathy, misrepresentation, and the power of an unscrupulous 
purse. And he has been successful. He has made Congo 
Reform a part of the sworn creed of many of our chief public 
men."— The Spectator. 

King Leopold's Rule in Africa 

London : Heinemann, 1904 

" An amazing book to be written in the dawn of the Twentieth 

Century of the Christian era."— Morning Post. 

Great Britain and the Congo 

London : Smith Elder & Co., 1905 

The British Case in French Congo 

London : Heinemann, 1903 

Affairs of West Africa 

London : Heinemann, 1902 

French Edition : '* Problemes de I 'Quest Africian " 

Translated by A. Duchene, Chief of the African Department of the 
French Colonial Office. 



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OF THE BRITISH AND GERMAN PEOPLES AND TO THE 

MAINTENANCE OF THE WORLD'S PEACE 

AND TO 

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FOREWORD 

BY J. RAMSAY MACDONALD, M.P. 

I REMEMBER well the unpleasant effect this book had upon 
me when I first read it over two years ago. I did not 
want to believe it, and yet its facts were so authoritative 
and its conclusions so logical that I had to believe it. No 
more merciless exposure of the dishonour which is accepted 
as honour in diplomatic circles has ever been made. 

** It is all ancient history now," it may be said. "We 
have our Egypt and France has her Morocco, and the end 
has justified the means." But the fact is that the events 
and the policy exposed in this hook form an introduction 
to the present war. The Morocco affair slammed the doors 
in the faces of the peacemakers in Europe. 

I wrote at the time that it looked as though we had 
ended the policy of French pin-pricks in Egypt at the price 
of an enormous navy in the North Sea and an ultimate war. 
The Morocco experience had a most unfortunate influence 
on the mind of Germany. It convinced many of my own 
Socialist friends (particularly those of the Revisionist 
School who concern themselves more than the others with 
real politics) that Germany was the victim of an evil con- 
spiracy, and that our friendship was merely feigned ; and 
it is also said with some show of authority that our readi- 
ness to go to war in support of the French claims in 
Morocco (though they were in violation of a treaty only a 
year or so old and in contradiction of our openly professed 
intentions though not of our secretly made agreements) 
convinced the Kaiser that sooner or later he would have to 
yield to the militarist advisers to whom he had hitherto 
lent but a deaf ear. In any event, 1911-1912 are the years 
of the diplomatic changes which immediately preceded the 



FOREWORD 

war. Then Fate became mischievous and malevolent, and 
even those who were but onlookers could not help seeing- 
the gathering of the clouds on the horizon. This book 
explains those years, and the most strikingly dramatic 
part of its revelation is that the agreements we made with 
France openly were good and made for peace, whilst those 
we made secretly were the cause of trouble, ill-feeling, and 
war. This is a most significant circumstance, and has an 
important bearing on the demand of growing strength that 
secret diplomacy should be done away with. 

Mr. Morel has written history with a merciless 
accuracy. It ought to be read by everyone who is think- 
ing of what the settlement after peace can be, for it reveals 
a method of government which is as inconsistent with 
and as subversive to democracy and popular freedom as 
Prussian militarism itself. 



xiB 



PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION 

June, 1918. 

The secret diplomacy of the war, revealed through 
the publication by the Russian Revolutionary Government 
of the Treaties and Arrangements concluded between the 
Allies since the war broke out, increases the need for 
studying the secret diplomacy which preceded the war. 

The most complete record of pre-war secret diplomacy 
on the Entente side is to be found in this volume, which 
now goes to a Fifth Edition. 

In reading the Morocco storyj two facts should be con- 
stantly borne in mind : 

First, Morocco forged the chain which was to bind the 
British people, absolutely, to the fortunes of the third 
French Republic, and, in view of France's Treaty with 
Russia, to the decomposing corpse of Tsardooi. 

Secondly, French official writers now freely admit^ 
— why, indeed, should they notP^that Morocco caused 
the scales oscillating between the Peace Party and the 
War Party in Germany to weigh down heavily on the side 
of the latter, and gave an enormous accretion of strength 
to the fatalistic school which looked upon war as 
" inevitable." 

These facts can be accepted as historically true — apart 
altogether from the intrinsic merits of the Moroccan 

ISee in particular the opening despatches in the French Yellow 
Book on the War. 



PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION 

quarrel — by those who approve the policy followed by the 
British Foreign Office in committing us in honourable 
obligations to France, and contingently to Tsardom, with 
all the train of consequences which that policy has 
involved ; and by those who, like the writer, condemn that 
policy. 

And it is these facts which give to the triangular 
Franco-British-German dispute about Morocco in 1905 
and 191 1, an importance altogether disproportionate to 
the immediate and specific implications of the dispute 
itself. 

The issues themselves were comparatively trifling. 
That which grew out of them was cataclysmic. 

To the peoples of France, Germany, and Britain the 
land of the Moors was a name : hardly that. In the com- 
plex play and interplay of diplomatic intrigue,- of national 
vanity and antipathies, ' * largely created ' ' — as Lecky 
remarks — *'by newspaper invectives, and by the gross 
partiality of newspaper representations," to which ** most 
modern wars may be ultimately traced," Morocco became 
a symbol and a portent. 

This book, . originally published two and a half years 
before the outbreak of war, and reproduced unaltered^ 
closes with the settlement of the immediate and specific 
issues which gave rise to the dispute. It provides a 
detailed narrative of the antecedents and origin of that 
dispute, and of the course taken in regard to it. 

Now, six years later, I have no occasion to modify my 
narrative in the slightest degree. The accuracy of none 
'Of the data it contains has been challenged. It is true that 
Prince Lichnowsky's recently published memoirs include 

1 Except for a few structural and verbal amendments. 

XV 



PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION 

some general reflections on the subject, which appear 
to invalidate the conclusions set forth in this volume. But 
a casual reference in a couple of hundred words to a 
complicated series of transactions covering a period of 
twenty years, offers no basis for comparison and examina- 
tion. Moreover, Prince Lichnowsky was not German 
Ambassador in London during any portion of the 
Moroccan .dispute. He only received his appointment to 
the Court of St. James a year after Germany had con- 
cluded her Convention with France, and had recognised 
a French Protectorate. On the other hand, the reports 
of the Belgian diplomatic representatives in London^ 
Paris, and Berlin, written while the dispute was in pro- 
gress, fully bear out my conclusions.^ 

A fortnight before his murder, Jaur^s had publicly 
censured more severely than I ventured to do, the actions 

of his Government in Morocco, which, he said, had 
"thereby inaugurated in Europe an era of ambitions^ 
covetousness, and conflicts," and set the example for the 
breaches of the Treaty of Berlin in the Austrian annexa- 
tion of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and in the Italian descent 
upon Tripoli. 

So' much for the narrative here set out. 

It was only on the actual eve of hostilities between 
Britain and Germany — on August 3, 19 14, two years and 
a half after this book appeared — that we learned positively 
that the first undertaking towards France originated in 
the Morocco crisis of 1905, and was completed during the 
second Morocco crisis in 191 1. 

It was only then that the nation became aware that 
Morocco was the originating cause through which the 

^'Vide Preface to Third Edition. 



PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION 

British people became morally pledged to support France 
— and Tsardom — against Germany and Austria in the 
event of a European war. 

That is why the Morocco dispute is, and must ever be, 
for the British people, a capital episode in the national 
annals, and a turning point in the national destinies. 

E. D. Morel. 



PREFACE TO FIRST AND SECOND 
EDITIONS 

December, 1914. 

Except for a few structural and verbal alterations which 
make the meaning- and chronology easier to follow, this 
volume is a mere reprint, minus the appendix of documents, 
of the one entitled "Morocco in Diplomacy," which was 
published by Messrs. Smith, Elder and Co. in the spring 
of 1912. 

I have deliberately refrained from all other chang-es and 
from any attempt to bring- the subject up to date,^ because 
whatever value and importance this work may have is now 
concerned in my eyes with the circumstance of its explana- 
tion of the events of 19 14 being- not retrospective, but 
prospective.^ 

The book was written in the hope of helping to avert 
a catastrophe such as has now overwhelmed us. It was 
a chapter of the mistaken policy which already in 191 1 had 
made the present European War a threatening possibility. 
It was a passionate and hopeless appeal to get that policy 
abandoned while it was still time. Needless to say that 

1 Except in the matter of the new Note facing page 178. 

'^e.g., page 183, "To-day (Spring, 1912) we are confronted with 
this situation. The German nation firmly believes not only that it is 
threatened by Great Britain, but that Great Britain intends to take 
the first favourable opportunity to force a war. The British nation 
knows itself to be absolutely innocent of any such desire or intention. 
Is there a way out of the impasse? Only, it seems to me, if British 
public opinion will think out the problem for itself, face the issues 
squarely and resolutely, and decline any longer to tolerate being in the 
position of finding itself involved in war without any real knowledge 
of the why and the wherefore.'' 

Again, page 200 et seq. *' It is in the interest neither of the 
British nor of the French peoples that they should be fettered in their 
intercourse with other peoples ; or committed by their Governments 
to a definite course of action in advance." 

And page 202. " Especially is it necessary for the common-sense 
-elements in the British nation to set their faces like flint against the 
sections in Britain and France desirous of distorting. the existence of 
friendly relations with France into an instrument of aggression against 
■Germany." 



PREFACE TO FIRST AND SECOND EDITIONS 

:the story of our diplomatic entang-lements in the past, and 
vthe warning against their continuation in the future, 
remained equally unnoticed. The danger we had run in 
191 1, evident and enormous though it had been, was a 
danger escaped ; and having escaped it. Englishmen 
remained lazily willing to leave once more the fate of 
Europe at the mercy of a system which had, after all, 
brought only the peril of war, not war itself. Indeed it is 
probable that the diplomacy which had created that peril 
of 191 1 was even given credit for having averted it ! 

, But now the catastrophe has come. It has become 
evident that Secret Diplomacy and the ** Balance of 
Power," with their alliances and commitments, have not 
saved Europe from a universal loss of life, of wealth, of 
international goodwill far surpassing the most frightful 
examples and the most frightful forecasts. We are now 
in the presence of the utter failure of the old-fashioned 
methods of safeguarding peace by preparing for war. A'nd 
it may therefore be that the story of Morocco in Dip- 
lomacy, that is to say of ten years of secret diplomacy, will 
now command more attention and that its lesson will now 
he taken to heart by a reading public which was indifferent 
to warnings of future perils, but which is already, and will 
be more and more, seeking eagerly for the origin of present 
calamities. And the story of Morocco in Diplomacy is not 
merely one of the historical explanations of the present 
war ; it is also the type of many other similar explanations. 
For this reason, as already said, I have chosen to leave 
the book as it was, feeling that its value, that is to say 
whatever influence it may possibly have in preparing a less 
dangerous future, consists largely in the circumstance that 
if it helps to explain 191 4, that explanation had already 
sbeen furnished in 191 2. 

E. D. Morel. 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

October, 191 5- 

I EXPLAINED in the " New Preface "^ why I had 
authorised this reprint of the orig-inal volume, and why I 
had not developed the sequel of the story therein set forth 
through its various phases to its logical consummation — 
the great war. This reprint has now reached a third 
edition, and it seems appropriate to allude briefly to two 
collections of diplomatic documents which have appeared 
since the issue of the second edition, and which throw a 
vivid light upon the facts adduced and the arguments 
advanced by the Author in the Spring of 191 2 — the date 
of the original publication. The first of these collections 
is contained in the French Yellow Book^ on the war. The 
documents it embraces demonstrate beyond any possibility 
of doubt the capital role played by the Morocco quarrel 
in bringing about the cataclysm which has overwhelmed 
civilisation. If these documents, upon which I have com- 
mented in a recent pamphlet,^ stood alone, they would 
justify to the hilt what I wrote here, three-and-a-half 
years ago. But they do not stand alone. It now trans- 
pires that at the very time I was engaged in v/riting this 
book the diplomatic representatives of a neutral country, 
which has since suffered so cruelly — Belgium — resident at 
Berlin, London and Paris, were expressing to their 
Government, precisely the same views as to the character 
of Anglo-French diplomacy in the Morocco affair and* 
towards Germany generally, which I was endeavouring 
to express to the British Public ; that they were consumed 
by the same fears as I was, and that they had come to- 
the same conclusions as I had, reluctantly and by the 
sheer weight of evidence, arrived at. Moreover, they had! 
been expressing similar views for several years before m;y 
book appeared, and they continued to do so with an ever- 
increasing vehemence to within a few weeks of the crash^ 

1 P. xxiii. 

2Cd. 7717. 

3 "Morocco and Armageddon,' National Labour Press, idi. 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

So extraordinary, indeed, is the similarity, not only of 
ideas but, in some cases, of actual language, that I might 
have had access to the majority of these State docu- 
ments when compiling my volume ! Never before, I 
imagine, have such disclosures become publicly accessible 
in the life-time of the contemporary generation.^ Never, 
certainly, has an author dealing with international affairs 
been able, in his life-time, to invoke such a mass of cor- 
roborative testimony. In many respects, indeed, these 
Belgian diplomatic reports go further than anything which 
is to be found in my book. My object was at once to 
appeal and to warn. They conceived it to be their duty 
not only to warn, but to denounce the diplomacy of the 
British and French Foreign Offices with a vigour as direct 
as it is uncompromising. These are samples of their 
language at the time of the second Morocco crisis : 
** France signed the Algeciras Act with the firm intention 
■of never observing it," writes Baron Greindl from Berlin 
(April, 191 1 ). " England, which has pushed France into 
the Moroccan morass, contemplates complacently her 
work," writes Baron Guillaume from Paris (April, 191 1). 
*' There will be much less chance of reaching an under- 
standing with Germany if England takes part in the con- 
versation," this from the same pen (July, 191 1). And 
again, in the course of a despatch, in which he states his 
disbelief in a French desire for war at that moment, and 
expresses '* very great confidence in the pacific sentiments 
of the German Emperor " : 

** T experience, generally speaking, less faith in Great 
Britain's desire for peace, for she does not dislike to see 
other parties devouring one another. ... As I 
thought from the first day, the key of the situation is in 
London." (July, 191 1.) 

IThe documents in question are 119 in number, and cover the 
period of 1905-1914. They were discovered in the Belgian Archives, 
and have been published in the original French and in German, by the 
German Government in the Norddeutsche AUgemeine Zeitung, of 
which they fill several special supplements in July and August. Their 
authenticity has not been questioned. The authors of the Reports are 
as follows : 

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited tcJ the British 
Government : Count de Lalaing and M. E. de Cartier. 

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited to the French 
Government : Baron Guillaume, Count d'Arschot Schoonhoven, 
and M. A, Leghait. 

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited to the German 
Government : Baron Greindl and Baron Beyens. 

xxi 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

** 1 am assured," writes the same Belgian diplomatist : 
" that the first intention of England was to propose tO' 
France that the two Governments should each send with- 
out delay a couple of men-of-war to Agadir. The Paris- 
Cabinet opposed the proposal in the strongest terms, and 
there it ended." (August, 191 1.) 

The Count de Lalaing, referring to Lord Courtney's 
speech in the House of Lords criticising the policy of the 
Government on the ground that it appeared to aim at the 
isolation of Germany, remarks : 

"It is rare to hear this truth stated in the British Parlia- 
ment." (November, 191 1.) 

There are several remarkable despatches towards the 
close of that year from Baron Greindl and Count de 
Lalaing, reviewing the crisis. The former writes : 

'* Sir E. Grey declared that there is no secret Treaty 
between England and France other than the one which 
has been published.^ I do not question his sincerity; but 
it is none the less true that with or without a written or 
verbal engagement, everyone in England and France con- 
siders the entente cordiale as a defensive and offensive 
alliance against Germany. . . . The entente cordiale 
was founded, not on the positive basis of a defence of 
common interests, but on the negative basis of hatred 
against the German Empire. . . . It is the entente 
which has revived the spirit of revenge in France which 
had largely subsided. The condition of anxiety and dis- 
comfort in which Europe has been writhing for the past 
seven years originates with it." 

" . . . . Until advised to the contrary, we must, 
/ therefore, regard as admitted that the project of helping 
France in a war with Germany by landing 150,000 mea 
has been discussed in London. ^ There is nothing in this 
which need surprise us. It is the continuance of the 
singular proposals which were made a few years ago to 
General Ducarne by Colonel Barnardiston.-^ . . . Was 

l/.e., the»secret clauses of the Anglo-French Declaration and the 
Secret Franco-Spanish Convention, revealed by the French newspaper* 
in November, 191 1. 

2 Compare with p. 146 of text and foot-note (i) to p. xxv. 

3 In connection with the possible landing of British troops in 
Belgium. The statements made by Colonel Barnardiston, our military 
attach^, have been disavowed by Sir E. Grey. 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

it not tantamount to claiming a right of veto upon Ger- 
man enterprise to raise such a clamour because a German 
war-vessel had anchored at Agadir when England had 
observed without a tremor the progressive conquest of 
Moroccan territory by France and the crushing of the 
Sultan's independence? England could not act otherwise. I 
She was tied by her secret Treaty with France. The* 
explanation is of the simplest — but not at all calculated L 
to appease German irritation. The consequence (of the f 
secret Treaty) was that, that at the very moment the Act | 
of Algeciras was signed, three at least of the participating : 
Powers were contracting undertakings among themselves i 
which were incompatible with their public professions.^ 
(December, 191 1.) 

Count de Lalaing is equally outspoken. Commenting 
upon the reaction which set in against the anti-German 
character of our diplomacy when the facts became better 
known and the nation realised that it had stood on the 
brink of war, Belgium's representative in London 
remarks : 

'* People here hardly dare to admit that they have been 
more loyalist than the King, more intractable than the 
friend they desired to support. ^ . . . The entente, 
solely designed to dispel certain specified clouds, was not 
an Alliance. The fault of the Asquith Government has 
been to look upon it, in fact, as such, wath the result that 
serious enmity against Great Britain has arisen in Berlin.'* 
(January, 191 2.) 

All through 191 2 and 19 13 we find anxiety displayed 
by these Belgian diplomatists as to the far-reaching effect 
of the Morocco affair upon the peace of the world. In 
this respect Baron Guillaume's despatches from Paris are 
most illuminating. The growing popularity of President 
Poincar^ he considers ominous : 

'' One must see in this, first of all a manifestation of 
the old French jingoistic spirit which had been eclipsed 
for many years, but which has assumed new life since 
the Agadir incident. M. Poincar^ is a Lorrainer, and 
never loses an occasion to recall it. He was the colla- 
borator and instigator of the militarist policy of M. 
Millerand. " (February, 1913.) 

1 Compare with Chapter XIII 

2 Compare with p. 148 of the text. 

^xiii 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

The dangerous lengths to which French jingoism is 
proceeding is the constant theme of the Belgian despatches, 
and the sinister effect of the Morocco affair is alluded to : 

** Steps should be taken to stop this tendency which 
the Government has really encouraged since the Agadir 
affair and the formation of the Poincar^-Millerand- 
Delcasse Ministry. . . . Half the theatres in Paris 
are now playing jingo pieces. . . . The Journal pub- 
lishes this morning an article entitled ' To the Frontier.* " 
(April, 1913.) 

The pessimistic note becomes more and more accen- 
tuated : 

The propaganda in favour of the three years (military) 
law which is calculated to bring about an awakening of 
chauvinism, has been admirably prepared and carried out ; 
it began by bringing about the election of M. Poincar^ 
to the Presidency. It continues its work without thought 
of the dangers to which it gives rise ; uneasiness is great 
in the country. 'V (June, 1913.) 

In a grave passage he denounces French chauvinism 
(or rather the chauvinism of certain powerful French 
political groups, ** the General Staff and the jingoes," 
because he pays a tribute to the generally pacific dis- 
positions of the French people) as a danger to Europe and 
Belgium : 

" I have already had the honour of reporting that it 
is Messrs. Poincare, Delcasse, Millerand, and their friends 
who have invented and pursued the nationalist, boastful 
and chauvinistic policy, whose renascence we are witness- 
ing. It is a danger for Europe and for Belgium. I see 
in it the greatest peril which threatens the peace of Europe 
to-day, not because I am entitled to suppose that the 
Government of the Republic intends deliberately to break 
it — I think rather the contrary — but because the attitude 
of the Barthou Cabinet is, in my opinion, the determining 
cause of the increase of military tendencies in Germany." 

In the same despatch he refers to the incessant calls 
for more soldiers from the French military commanders 
in Morocco. (January, 1914.) A few days before Baron 
Guillaume was expressing himself thus, Count de Lalaing 
was reporting from London that the fall of the Barthou 
Cabinet was looked upon as an attack upon President 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

Poincar^, ''persona grata with the London Cabinet"; 
that the opposition in France to the three-years' law was 
regarded " with some bitterness," and that the somewhat 
"unusual" course had been taken to issue an exchange 
-of official telegrams with the new French Premier (M. 
Barthou's successor) and with M. Sazanoff, the Russian 
Foreign Minister, announcing a common intention to col- 
laborate in maintaining the Franco-Russian alliance. The 
bellicosity of M. Poincar^, " persona grata with the 
London Cabinet," continues to be accentuated by the 
Belgian Minister in Paris, Baron Guillaume. He speaks 
-of the *' military and nationalist policy " which M. 
Poincare has ** systematically pursued since he became 
Premier " : 

*' With Messrs. Delcass^, Millerand, and a few others 
he postulated persistently a political and military uplift- 
ing (relevement) for France, combined with closer and 
more trusting relations with Russia. He went to Petro- 
grad as Premier ; he will return thither in a few months 
as President. He recently despatched thither M. Delcass6, 
to whom he had confided the mission of seeking by every 
means to exalt the benefits of the Franco-Russian alliance 
and to induce the great Empire to accentuate its military 
preparations. (March, 1914.) 

Baron Guillaume insists again and again upon the 
impossibility in which France will find herself to main- 
tain the three-years' law for more than a relatively short 
period. He speaks of the dislike of the country for the 
law and of the extreme violence of the Paris Press cam- 
paign in favour of it : 

" Every possible means has been adopted to influence 
public opinion, even to the point of seeking to compromise 
General Joffre. We have even seen the French Ambassa- 
dor at Petrograd take a step — contrary to all usages — 
and somewhat dangerous for the future of France. Is 
it true that the Petrograd Cabinet imposed the three-years' 
law upon this country, and is pressing with all its weight 
for the maintenance of that law? I have not been able 
to secure light upon this delicate matter, but it would be 
all the graver because the men who direct the destiny of 
the Empire of the Tsars cannot be ignorant that the effort 
which is being thus demanded of the French people is 
excessive and cannot be long sustained. Is. then, the 

XXV 

Lc] 



PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION 

attitude of the Cabinet of Petrograd based upon the con- 
viction that events are near enoug-h to use the tool which 
it intends to place in the hands of its ally." (June, 1914.) 

A week later the Count de Lalaing reports what he 
conceives to be the British view, which is that the three- 
years' law " can alone permit the Republic to honour the 
engagements which bind it to its ally, Russia, and to its 
friend England." The last despatch but one is from 
Baron Beyens in Berlin, who speaks of Russia, "who is 
directing the Dual Alliance to her exclusive profit, and 
who is also increasing her armaments in enormous pro- 
portions. " He hopes that in the interests of Belgium the 
three-years' law may be dropped. 

Such is a very bald epitome of some of the Belgian 
documents which have now seen the light of day, which 
have doubtless been communicated to the Government of 
every neutral State, and which have probably appeared in 
the papers of neutral countries. Their importance to the 
people of Britain and of France in the future work of 
European reconstruction, in consort with the people of 
Germany — which is the world's only hope — cannot be 
exaggerated. Their character is such as to bring con- 
viction to any sane mind that if the Entente Governments 
imagined themselves to be threatened by the Teutonic 
Powers, the latter had equally good reason to believe 
themselves threatened by the Governments of the Entente. 
In the eyes of these Belgian diplomatists, neutral 
observers stationed in the innermost sanctuaries of the 
great world of diplomatic intrigue, British and French 
diplomacy had for the past seven years been steadily 
directed to the isolation and discomfiture of Germany all 
over the world. If they thought that, how must the Ger- 
man Government, and Germany's diplomatic representa- 
tives abroad, have interpreted the situation ! In the face 
of these documents the charge that Germany cynically 
planned this war and let Hell loose upon Europe is no 
longer tenable by anyone who retains a sense of judg- 
ment. The blame has not been hers alone. Ten years of 
secret diplomacy have done their deadly work. If the 
British Parliament were wisely inspired it would insist 
upon the integral publication of these documents in this 
country. 

E. D. Morel. 



PREFACE TO FOURTH EDITION 

"Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy '' goes to a fourth 
edition. This shows that the importance of the Morocco 
intrigue as a factor in producing the great war is 
becoming increasingly evident to a considerable body of 
opinion. And therein lies hope for the future. For, 
unless a contemplation of the universal wreckage induces 
a grim resolve to investigate its origin, in order to avoid 
its repetition, the future is black indeed. 

In the Personal Foreword to ** Truth and the War '* 
— a later book which contains a brief summary of the 
Morocco affair, and which should be read in connection 
with " Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy " — mention is 
made of a number of books, by different authors, on 
international relations published since the third edition, 
and in which the facts collected in this work receive 
generous acknowledgment. But these facts continue 
to be studiously ignored by the great majority of writers 
on public affairs. The falsification of events which did 
duty in 1905, and again in 191 1, is perpetuated in 1916. 
Nothing that has since transpired is permitted to affect 
the parrot-like iteration of myths long exposed. Invin- 
cible determination to remain ignorant, or deliberate 
policy? Who shall tell? But when the Minister respon- 
sible for our foreign relations, and, therefore, presumed 
to possess a knowledge of history more profound than 
that of a leader writer on the Daily Mail, actually 
imputes^ sole responsibility to Germany . . . for the 
war, not of 1914, hut of i8'/o, we can hardly expect a 
regard for accuracy concerning the Morocco affair from 
those who accept such a statement as that with unruffled 
equanimity. It is, therefore, all to the good that *' Ten 
Years of Secret Diplomacy " is still being read by people 
who desire to get at facts in order to form judgments. 

E. D. Morel. 



ILord Grey addressing the Foreign Press Association on October 
23rd, 1916. 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

February 29, 19 12. 

Perhaps I should preface this volume by a brief profession 
of faith which is my justification — to myself — for having 
written it. 

I believe that the greatest national interest of the 
British people is at this moment, and will continue 
increasingly to be, the establishment and maintenance of 
friendly relations with Germany ; a full and frank exami- 
nation by responsible statesmen in both countries of the 
national problems peculiar to each in their relations with 
one another, leading to an appreciation of their respective 
national necessities, and to a mutual adjustment of the 
same with the sacrifice neither of honour, nor prestige, 
nor legitimate needs on either side. 

I believe that no greater disaster could befall both 
peoples, and all that is most worthy of preservation in 
modern civilisation, than a war between them. 

I reject the theories, based for the most part upon 
faulty and inapplicable historic similitudes, pointing to 
the inevitableness of such war. 

In common with every Briton of ordinary intelligence, 
I perceive that in the early part of last year the relations 
of the two peoples which, after passing through a period 
of recurrent crises, were beginning to show visible signs 
of steady advance towards the old friendly feeling, have 
received a deplorable set-back. 

The information which reaches me accords with that 
which persons of weight declare to be such as they them- 
selves are in receipt of, viz., that not one school of thought 
only, but the whole German nation, is seething with an 
absolutely genuine sense of grievance against the British 
Government. 

In common with every Briton of ordinary intelligence, 
I am aware that this set-back in Anglo-German relations 
is due to the view taken in Germany of the attitude adopted 
by the British Foreign Oflfice, endorsed by a considerable 
section of the British Press, towards Germany last summer 
in the course of the negotiations between that Power and 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

France relating to the question of Morocco — a question 
which had already given rise to considerable friction in 

1905- 

Moreover, it is now no secret — it has been publicly 
vouched for by several members of Parliament and naval 
officers — that the British Government had fully determined 
to support, if necessary, the French case against the 
German by force of arms, and had, indeed, undertaken 
naval and military preparation to that end.^ 

Holding the beliefs stated above, it seemed to me that 
the German view was deserving of careful study in the light 
of facts publicly accessible in order to ascertain whether it 
reposed upon any sort of foundation. 

At an early stage in the investigation, I acquired the 
conviction that Germany's action in despatching the small 
gun-boat Panther, of 1,000 tons^ burthen and an equip- //^ 
ment of 125 men, to anchor off an open roadstead on the 
Atlantic coast of Morocco, had been grossly misinter- 
preted ; the step being an incident in a series of inter- 
connected circumstances extending over a period of nearly 
ten years, in the course of which Germany had had legiti- 
mate causes of complaint at her treatment by French and 
British diplomacy. 

To this conviction I have already given utterance.^ 

i Recent Ministerial statements have been concerned in denyinj' 
that the British Government meditated a gratuitous attack upoi 
Germany last summer. This denial may have been necessary to caliv. 
German opinion. It was not required to convince home opinion o'k 
the inaccuracy of the allegation. The denial does not, from the 
British national standpoint, touch the kernel of the question. The 
incontestable facts remain : (i) that the British Government assured 
France last summer that France could count upon British naval and 
military support in the event of war arising out of a Franco-German 
rupture over Morocco, and had taken elaborate preparations to that 
end ; (2) that this assurance went beyond any British national com- 
mitment, then or now avowed, towards the French Republic ; (3) that 
the French Government's case was intrinsically bad since it reposed 
upon the violation by France of an International Treaty ; (4) that this 
violation was committed with the approval of the British Foreign 
Office, and arose out of secret arrangements between the British, 
French, and Spanish Governments contracted in 1904, and of which 
the British people, and the world, knew nothing until November, 191 1 ; 
(5) that the attitude of the British Foreign Oflfice in the early, and 
most critical, stage in the Franco-German negotiations was such as 
gravely to increase the possibilities of a Franco-German rupture. 

2 With two guns, calibre 10.5 cm., and six machine guns. 

3 Vide The Nineteenth Century and After, for November, 191 1, 
and February, 1912 ; a series of letters entitled ** How Wars are 
Made," in The Daily News in October, 1911, etc. 

xxix 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

But as more and more light was thrown upon the 
subject, as disclosures of secret arrangements, unknown 
to the British people, negotiated by the British Foreign 
Office with the Foreign Offices of France and Spain, 
assumed precision ; as successive revelations in France 
showed both the inadequacy, and in several important 
respects, the inaccuracy of the statement explanatory of 
the British official attitude given by Sir Edward Grey in 
the House of Commons on November 2"] last, the neces- 
sity of a fuller treatment became apparent. 

It was increasingly obvious that the policy recom- 
mended in distinguished quarters of attempting to soothe 
German feelings by homeopathic doses in the shape of 
friendly speeches of a general character, combined with a 
studious avoidance of the source of the trouble, was some- 
what lacking in courage and perhaps not quite dignified. 
From another point of view, too, this policy was not one 
which, so it appeared to the author, could be regarded as 
adequate. It is of vital moment ihe nation should realise 
that in this matter it has been led blindfolded to the very 
brink of war, as ihe outcome of liabilities secretly c:>n- 
tracted by its diplomatists without its authority. Also 
that, in the final resort, the existence of these secret liabili- 
ties has only been acknowledged by the Foreign Office 
subsequent to their publication in a couple of Parisian 
newspapers.^ To write Finis over the Morocco contro- 
versy, assuming that to do so were in other respects wise 
or even possible, would be, under these circumstances, for 
the nation to admit that it is prepared to assent to such 
treatment being meted out to it in the future, and for my 



IThe existence, and in part the actual substance of Secret Articles 
attached to the Anglo-French Declaration over Morocco was revealed 
in Le Temps of November ii, 191 1. A question was then put in the 
House of Commons ; Sir E. Grey admitted in reply the existence of 
Secret Articles, and they were subsequently communicated to Parlia- 
ment. The Secret Franco-Spanish Convention of October, 1904, was 
published in Le Matin of November 9, 191 1, reproduced in Le Temps 
of the same evening, and afterwards published in a British White 
Book together with the Exchange of Notes between Lord Lansdowne 
and the French Ambassador concerning it. The effect of these two 
Treaties — the second arose out of the first and was, indeed, imposed 
upon France by the British Government — was to involve this count.-v 
in approved and diplomatic support of a partition of Morocco 
between France and Spain, and thereby, to inevitable conflict with 
Germany, as explained in this volume. That is not an expression of 
opinion: but a bald statement of fact. 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

part I cannot bring- myself to believe in so humiliating a 
confession of national impotence. 

It seemed, then, advisable to place in the hands of the 
British public a connected narrative of the dealings of their 
own diplomacy and that of three other Powers chiefly 
interested in Morocco — France, Spain, and Germany — 
together with a comprehensive appendix, foot-notes and 
maps which would enable the reader, at any rate to a very 
great extent, to exercise a check upon the statements of 
facts in the body of the volume and upon the conclusions 
drawn from those facts by the author.^ 

His conclusions the author makes no attempt to con- 
ceal. They are that from first to last the British people 
have been systematically misled and misinformed as to 
the part played by Germany in the Morocco question. 
And for these reasons : first, because the genesis of 
German action has lain in the existence of secret con- 
ventions and arrangements between the British, French 
and Spanish Governments, withheld from the knowledge 
of the British people, who have, therefore, been induced 
to form their judgment upon incomplete data; secondly, 
because a concerted effort, inspired by certain influences 
connected with the British diplomatic machine, and con- 
veyed to the British public through the medium of 
powerful newspapers, has been consistently pursued with 
the object of portraying German policy in the Morocco 
question in a uniformly sinister light. That effort, it is 
right to add, has been much assisted by a section of Ger- 
man chauvinis'ts and German jingo newspapers, who have 
throughout striven to goad their Government into depart- 
ing from the logical and straightforward, if sometimes 
clumsy, policy it appears to me to have steadily followed.^ 

IThe publishers of this reprint have thought it well, in order that 
the book might be produced at a popular price, to republish it minu-i 
the appendices, which, in the original, covered 133 pages of text. 

In certain cases, some of the least known documents have bpcn 
either incorporated bodily in the text, or quoted from at length. 

2 In the Economist of December 30, 1911, and Jai:uary 8, 1912, 
will be found a " valuation of the leading newspapers of Germany " 
which may be commended to all who desire to appreciate the inter- 
national significance attaching to the utterances of specific German 
Press organs. The writer of these interesting articles accentuates a 
^;ircumstance to which sufficient importance has not been attached in 
this country, viz. : That during almost the entire course of the Moricco 
crisis of last summer the German Government had a hostile Press, 
some papers attacking it for not claiming a portion of Morocco ; 
others because the French Congo was not regarded as wortn the 

xxxi 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

The Morocco problem itself, and that of the Conge 
which (in another aspect than the one the public is- 
familiar with) has now been grafted upon it, still contain 
numerous elements of international friction — possibly of 
very grave friction. As a French writer of repute has 
put it — 

"The arrangement of 191 1 is either the prelude to a 
real understanding between France and Germany, or it is- 
the prelude to war." 

In a considerable, it is not perhaps too much to say in 
a preponderating measure, the issue one way or another is- 
on the knees of the British people and their Government. 

If this book succeeds in carrying conviction to the mind 
of the Briton possessed of normal common-sense and 
sanity, that, on the one hand, Germany's actions through- 
out this entire controversy have been misrepresented, and 
on the other hand, that the British and French peoples alike- 
have been led to the verge of war with Germany, not 
because of alleged deep-rooted antagonisms or conflicts 
due to " elemental forces," but through the intrigues, the 
lack of straightforward dealing, and the absence of fore- 
sight on the part of diplomacy working in the dark and 
concealing its manoeuvres from the national gaze — the 
author will have achieved his purpose. 

E. D. Morel. 

P.S. — This book was already in the printers' hands 
when Lord Haldane's visit to Berlin was announced. That 
visit has been followed by official expressions" on either 
side of good augury for the future. Everyone will rejoice 
at these first-fruits of a resolute public pressure upon 
Downing Street^ during the past four months. I am; 
tempted to think that a detailed history of the Moroccan^ 
imbroglio, far from being less necessary, is now more than 
ever required. And for these reasons. If a genuine 
movement for an understanding has really begun in the 
official world as the result of public insistence, it is 
essential that the popular feeling provoked should be rein- 
forced by additional arguments reposing not on admirable 
but more or less vague desires, but upon a study of con- 
abandonment of the German diplomatic position in regard I0 
Morocco, and — at one time — all of them because they heH".vcd the 
German Government had lacked firmness in its diplomatic dealings 
with Britain. 

iThe British Foreign Office. 

xxxii » 



ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION 

Crete facts on the specific issue which has caused the 
ill-feeling- it is proposed to attempt to remove It is 
essential, too, for the durability of any understanding that 
may be reached, that the British public should thoroughly 
apprehend the reasons which have brought about a 
situation all now realise to be fraught with the gravest 
peril. Finally, the circumstance that so happy but so 
brusque a change in the British official attitude should be 
possible, and should be (again, happily) supported by 
influential British newspapers which only a few weeks ago 
were replete with sentiments completely at variance with 
those given utterance to in their columns to-day, constitutes 
in itself the most convincing of reasons why the nation 
should appreciate the events and the influences responsible 
for the opposite policy so long followed, and with which 
the nation — without altog^ether understanding it — is clearly 
out of sympathy. The welcome change indicated by Lord 
Haldane's visit to Berlin is a tribute, first and foremost, 
to the popular will in Britain. Let but the reflecting 
members of the community apply themselves to a compre- 
hension of what preceded this change, and a lesson will 
have been learned, the outcome of which should serve to 
place Anglo-German relations upon a footing of permanent 
friendliness and security — to the inestimable advantage not 
of the present generation only but of generations to come. 
The Morocco problem is not settled. In one sense 
it may be said to be only beginning. It will boom 
largfely on the horizon during- the lifetime of the present 
generation. 

E. D. M. 



CONTENTS 



^''OREWORD BY Mr. J. RaMSAY MacDoNALD 

Preface to Fifth Edition 
Preface to First and Second Editions 
'Preface to Third Edition 
Preface to Fourth Edition 
'■Original Introduction 



&11 

xiv. 
xviii . 

XX 

xxvii. 
xxviii 



PART I. 
FOREWORD. 



"CHAPTER 
I. 



II, 
illl. 

iV. 
V. 



PART II. 

EXPLANATORY OF THE RESPECTIVE ATTI- 
TUDE TOWARDS MOROCCO OF THE 
FOUR INTERESTED POWERS— BRITAIN, 
FRANCE, SPAIN, AND GERMANY— PRIOR 
TO THE EVENTS OF THE PAST DECADE 

.Britain and Morocco 7 

France and Morocco . . . . . . r^ 

Spain and Morocco . . ... . 16 

Germany and Morocco . . . . , . jS 



PART III. 

THE PUBLIC LAW OF EUROPE REGULAI"- 
ING THE INTERNATIONAL POSITION 
OF MOROCCO, AND ITS VIOLATION 

VI. The Act of Algeciras ...... 27 

VTI. The Crucial Artici.e of the Act of Algeciras . 34 

"VIII. The Progressive Violation of the Act of 

Algeciras — in brief . . . , , . 37 
xxxv 



CONTENTS. 

PART IV. 

THE ANTECEDENTS OF THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS 

IX. French Policy towards the Moorish Govern- 
ment, 1900-1903 45 

X. M. Delcasse's Attempt to Partition Morocco 

WITH Spain, 1900-1903 . . . . . 49 

XI. The Anglo-French Declaration of April, 1904, 

and its Secret Articles 52 

XII. The Franco-Spanish Declaration of October, 
1904, and the Secret Convention attached 
thereto ........ 58 

XIII. Summary of the Events of 1900-1904, and 

Reflections thereon 6> 

PART V. 

GERMANY'S ACCEPTANCE OF FRENCH ASSURANCES 

XIV. The Calm before the Storm ..... 6<> 

PART VI. 

GERMANY'S FIRST INTERVENTION (1905) 

XV. The German Emperor's Visit to Tangier, and 

ITS Effects upon British Public Opinion . . 75 

XVI. The German Case in 1905 ...... 83 

PART VII. 

PROLOGUE TO GERMANY'S SECOND INTERVENTION 

XVII. How Franqe (with British concurrence) tore up 
the Act of Algeciras, and how Spain followed 
suit . . . . . . . 99 

PART VIII. 

GERMANY'S SECOND INTERVENTION (1911), 
AND THE ENSUING ANGLO-GERMAN CRISIS 

XVIII. Was Germany justified in sending the Panther 

TO Agadir? 113 

xxxvi 



CONTENTS 



XIX. How THE Despatch of the Panther to Agadir was 

GREETED IN PaRIS AND LONDON RESPECTIVELY . 123 

XX. Further Light upon the British Official 

Attitude from July i to July 12 . . . 131 

XXL The Story of an Announcement, an Interview, 

and a Speech 139 

XXI L An Analysis of the events of July 20 and 21 in 

THE Light of Facts now established . , . 147 

XXIIL the Aftermath of the Events of July 20 and 21 156 

XXIV. The Franco-German Settlement and its Effects 

UPON British Interests ..... 161 

XXV. An Appeal from Prejudice to Reason . . .168 

Maps I. Facing page 24. 

IL Facing page 48. 

III. Facing page 138. 

IV. & V. Facing page 154. 

Chronological Preci<^ 186 



Index 



193 



MAPS 



[These Maps have been specially drawn for publication in this volume.~lf 
I. Map of Morocco, showing Towns and Districts mentionei> 

IN the text. 

II. Map of Morocco Illustrating the Sphere recognised ti> 
Spain under the Franco-Spanish Secret Convention 
OF October, 1904, which remained secret until pub- 
lished in the Paris Matin, in November, 19 ii. 

III. Map of Part of West-Central Africa, showing the Area 

affected by the Franco-German Negotiations of June 
— November, 1911 ; and the Neighbouring Dependencies. 

IV. The Same indicating the Area which formed at one time in 

THE Franco-German Negotiations, the subject of special, 
discussion, 

V. The Same showing (A) Area ceded by France to Germany 

UNDER THE CONVENTION OF NOVEMBER 4, I9II ; (B) ArEA 

ceded BY Germany to France under the same Convention, 



PART 1. 
FOREWORD^. 



CHAPTER I. 

On July 3, 191 1, it became known that the Panther (a 
German gunboat of 1000 tons burthen, carrying two guns 
<:alibre 10.5 cm., six machine guns and 125 men) had cast 
anchor (but without sending a landing party on shore) in 
front of Agadir, a village of three hundred inhabitants, on 
the inhospitable, storm-tossed, surf -cursed coast of Atlantic 
Morocco. 

The event, which in itself seemed hardly worth 
chronicling in a newspaper paragraph, possessed, never- 
theless, considerable international importance, inasmuch 
as it was interpreted, and rightly interpreted, to mean that 
-Germany was not prepared to acquiesce tacitly in the 
changed condition of affairs in Morocco. 

Changed in what way? 

To answer that question we must consider what had 
•been the preceding relations of the chief European nations 
with Morocco, and what was the then ostensible position 
of Morocco according to the public agreements subscribed 
by those Powers at the Algeciras Conference of 1906. 

I will take the Moroccan relations of the Powers one by 
one, beginning with Great Britain. 



.10 



PART II. 

Explanatory of the respective attitude towards Morocco of 
the four interested Powers — Britain, France, Spain, 
and Germany — prior to the events of the past decade. 



CHAPTER 11. 



BRITAIN AND MOROCCO. 



*' You will observe — wrote Lord Salisbury to Sir Charles 
Euan-Smith upon his appointment as Envoy Extraordinary 
and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Emperor of Morocco 
on May i6, 1891^ — that it has been the constant aim of His 
Majesty's Government and of your predecessors at 
Tangier, to preserve the independence and territorial 
integrity of the Empire of Morocco, while neglecting no 
favourable opportunity of impressing upon the Sultan and 
his Ministers the importance and advantage of improving 
the government and administration of the country. 
Unfortunately, their efforts in this direction have hitherto 
been unsuccessful, and herein lies the great danger of the 
situation, as the decease of the present Sultan will, in all 
probability, give rise to internal disturbances, the issue of 
which it is impossible to foresee." 

This policy of Great Britain towards Morocco in what 
may be termed modern times was inspired, until the 
opening years of the present century, by the sentiment that 
the national interest required an independent Morocco. 
The view dictating this policy was primarily the strategic 
one that were the coasts of Mediterranean and North- 
Atlantic Morocco to fall into the hands of a European 
Power, the route to India would be threatened and the 
British position in the Mediterranean compromised. 

The larger policy, that of an independent Morocco, 
has now been wholly abandoned, although it was nominally 
revived by the Act of Algeciras in 1906, as will subsequently 
be explained. The strategical view has undergone a 
profound modification. Retained to the extent of excluding 
a first-class Power from occupying the sea-board referred 
to ; it has altered to the extent of allowing that occupation 
by a second-class Power under certain conditions. Those 
conditions are that no fortifications or strategic works shall 
be erected on the part of the aforesaid sea-board whence 

1 British White Book Cd. 6815. 
7 



8 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

the security of the Straits of Gibraltar might conceivably 
be menaced. It does not appear beyond the bounds of 
possibility that the limits within which such menace was 
held to be possible in 1904, may be restricted as the result of 
the Franco-Spanish negotiations now proceeding with the 
cognisance of the British Government. 

Whether these changes of policy were avoidable or 
unavoidable, wise or unwise, from the point of view of the 
national interest, it would be futile to discuss. The 
circumstances under which they have come about will 
appear as this narrati\e proceeds. 

The secondary but nevertheless extremely important 
consideration influencing British policy, until the opening 
years of the present century, was that of our commercial 
interests in Morocco which were, and are, extensive. The 
desire to preserve Morocco as an open market for British 
trade, and to remove the numerous disabilities under which 
British trade suffered at the hands of the Moorish Govern- 
ment, were matters regarded as worthy of attention by 
British diplomats in the latter half of the nineteenth century. 
With these united ends in view. Sir John Drummond Hay, 
the British representative at the Moorish court, laboured 
for many years : in the main successfully as regards the 
larger policy : with scant progress so far as inducing the 
Sultan to follow a more liberal line in his treatment of 
European commercial interests. 

In 1 89 1 Lord Salisbury decided to make a serious effort 
in this direction. He despatched a special Mission to Fez, 
attended by some pomp and circumstance,^ under Sir 
Charles Euan-Smith. The chief object of the Mission was 
the conclusion of a commercial Treaty ; but it was arranged 
that the slavery question should be tentatively referred to, 
and also that if the Sultan showed a friendly disposition, the 
good offices of the British Government should be used with 
the other Powers to diminish the evils connected with the 
system then, and still, existing, whereby Moorish subjects 

1 Sir C. Euan-Smith was accompanied by three members of the 
British legation, and by a military staff consisting of Colonel Hallam 
Parr, Major Monds, Surgeon-Captain Macpherson, Lieutenant Kirk- 
patrick, Lieutenant Wilson, and D. Beaufort, Esq. The Sultan 
deputed Kaid Harry Maclean to take charge of the Mission, which was 
received with military honours as it progressed towards the capital. 
Four ladies — members of Sir C. Euan-Smith's family — also accom- 
panied the party. 



BRITAIN AND MOROCCO o 

shed their allegiance to the Sultan by becoming- the ** pro- 
tected " subjects of this or that European Power.^ Lord 
Salisbury was at special pains to emphasise that the 
British Mission had no ulterior or secret motives, and 
impressed upon his envoy the necessity of so conducting 
himself that suspicions of British motives should not be 
aroused either in the mind of the Sultan or among the 
representatives of other European Powers.^ 

The Mission entirely failed. It was delayed for many 
weeks at Fez, while the Sultan tergiversated in the most 
approved Eastern style. That the failure was partly due 
to Sir C. Euan-Smith's somewhat autocratic bearing a 
perusal of the Despatches suggests. But the chief cause 
was unquestionably the misrepresentations v/hich, as Lord 
Salisbury afterwards remarked, ** attended the Mission 
from the first. "^ Nor is it possible to doubt whence came 
the numerous intrigues which wrecked the effort. Lord 
Salisbury, who acted throughout with the utmost straight- 
forwardness towards the Powers, had communicated the 
draft commercial Treaty Sir C. Euan-Smith had drawn up 
for presentation to the Sultan, to the German, Italian, 
Spanish, French, and Austrian Governments,* and had 
suggested to these Governments that their support for a 
measure calculated to serve the interests of all the Powers, 
and in no way aimed at securing ** the slightest privilege in 

IThe system had given rise to gross abuses, indeed to a species of 
blackmail at the expense of the Sultan, of which he justly complained. 

2 Vide quotation at the beginning of the chapter. To Sir C. Euan- 
Smith's early request that he should be authorised to use vigorous 
language to the Sultan were the latter intractable. Lord Salisbury 
demurred : " I should wish you to, abstain from anything in the nature 
of a menace, which would be doubly dangerous, because, if resisted, it 
might bring about a serious crisis, and, if successful, would place her 
Majesty's Government in the position of having undertaken the pro- 
tection of Morocco." (Despatch to Sir C. Euan-Smith, March 2, 1892.) 
" You should bear in mind the risk of leading other Powers to suppose 
that you are endeavouring to obtain exclusive advantages for this 
country." (Despatch, March 28, 1892.) [British White Book Cd. 
6815. ] 

3 British White Book Cd. 6821. 

4 Yet so important a French paper as the Journal des Dihats, 
which had openly accused the British Government of ulterior motives 
on July 21, actually stated on August 12 that Sir C. Euan-Smith's 
object was " to insert the thin end of the wedge which would force 
Morocco to accept her (Britain's) authority," adding that France 
intended to maintain Moroccan independence and integrity in spite of 
England, How passing strange it is to recall these utterances when 
contemplating present events ! 



lo TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

favour of England," would be welcome. The German,* 
Italian, and Austrian Governments had at once responded,, 
the two former with marked cordiality. Spain, after slight 
delay, had followed suit. France alone had held aloof, 
M. Ribot contenting- himself with the statement that the 
draft Treaty would be studied. A later request had met 
with the repetition of the former statement, accompanied 
by the expression of a doubt as to the Mission's intentions 
being confined to the subject-matter communicated. 
Meantime, the French Colonial press had started a fierce 
campaign against the British Mission, and throughout its 
stay at Fez had published a series of untruthful rumours as 
to its proceedings, inspired by the French representatives 
at Fez and Tangier, and followed, on one occasion, by a 
visit to the Foreign Office on the part of the French 
Ambassador.^ At his last interview with the Sultan, 
Sir C. Euan-Smith was told by the latter that he 
** acknowledged to the full that he had made many promises 
regarding certain articles in the Treaty, and regarding the 
signing of the Treaty, which he had not fulfilled. He said 
that other people had advised him that the promises he had 
made would have evil results for himself, and, therefore, 
he could not act up to them."^ Referring to the 
intrigues directed against the British Mission, Lord 
Salisbury added, rather contemptuously : ** It is not 
necessary to inquire with what object these inventions were 

1 The German and Italian ministers at Tangier showed themselves 
particularly anxious to assist the British Mission. (Sir C. Euan-Smith 
to Lord Salisbury, April 20, 1892.) The British Mission "was sup- 
ported by the representatives of Germany, Austria, Spain, and 
Belgium." (Times Tangier Correspondent, July 18, 1892.) 

2 July 15, 1892. 

3 " The action of the Moorish Government is attributed to French 
intrigue." (Reuter's Agent at Tangier, July 18, 1892.) "French 
action in this matter is, apparently, purely selfish, if not vindictive, as 
their Mission is prepared to start for Fez in September, expecting to 
obtain credit for negotiating a treaty and other proposals on the same 
lines as the British envoy." (Times Special Correspondent with the 
Mission, Times, July 22.) " News from Fez states that the Moorish 
Ministers who prevented the Sultan from concluding the British Treaty 
have each received $10,000 from the French agent." (Times Tangier 
Correspondent, August 13.) (In this connection* it is worthy of note 
that the Sultan offered Sir C. Euan-Smith ;^20,000 if he would drop- 
certain clauses in the commercial Treaty, and when the offer was 
declined expressed surprise, seeing that he had often induced certain 
representatives of other Powers to withdraw objectionable requests by 
the simple method of squaring them in this way. British White Book 
Cd. 6815.) 



\ 



BRITAIN AND MOROCCO ii 

, framed, or from what source they came. "^ Assuredly it 
was unnecessary. The French Press — even its leading 
organs — openly expressed its delight at the defeat of ^n 
unselfish attempt to save Morocco from itself and from the 
designs of its enemies. 

** The correspondence which has now been published " 
— concludes Lord Salisbury in his closing despatch to Sir 
C. Euan-Smith — ** will sufficiently establish that there was 
nothing in your Mission prejudicial to the independence 
and integrity of Morocco, or threatening in any way the 
Sultan's prerogative, or his territorial rights. It was con- 
ceived and carried out in a spirit entirely conformable to 
the policy which her Majesty's Government have uniformly 
pursued, of upholding the Moorish Empire, and discourag- 
ing all efforts either to diminish its extent or to precipitate 
its fall. "2 

Sir C. Euan-Smith's Mission constituted the last serious 
effort made by Britain to maintain the integrity and 
independence of Morocco, although British influence con- 
tinued to preponderate until about 1902. 

Nine years later (1901) the Moorish Government, filled 
with dismay at the sudden attitude assumed by France,^ 
appears' to have decided to throw itself upon the protection 
of Britain, and arranged to send a Mission to London. 
But here again French diplomacy effectively intervened. 
A Mission did come over, it i's true, but another one 

1 British White Book Cd. 682L 

2" As usual, France stood out. The Power which ' protects ' the 
Shereef of Wazan, and which with scarcely any disguise supports him 
in his attitude of something like rivalry to the Sultan of Morocco, has 
yet obtained influence enough with the latter to put a stop to negotia- 
ions which were directed to the common advantage of Europe. Pro- 
bably this will be represented to-morrow, by the Parisian journals, as 
' a triumph of French diplomacy. ' That Spain, Austria, England, 
and France herself are not to be allowed to import corn or horses from 
Morocco is ' a triumph for French diplomacy.' What it really means 
is that, even for a great common gain to Europe, France will not 
permit Great Britain to obtain influence at Fez lest, perchance, at 
some future time the claims of the mistress of Algeria to succeed to 
the Sultan's dominions should find themselves barred. The object is 
very problematic, and the immediate loss is very real. But there are 
some people to whom no present advantage counts in comparison to 
some sentiment of amour propre, especially of a national kind, and 
among these, we fear, are to be reckoned the French consular and 
diplomatic agents in backward countries, almost without exception, 
together with a large portion of the official and journalistic world of 
Paris." (Times Leader, July 19, 1892.) 

3 Vide Chapter III. 



12 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

accompanied it ... to Paris, ^ and the envoys to Britain 
merely talked commercial affairs, Lord Lansdowne securing 
a few of the minor advantages for international trade urged 
upon the Sultan by Sir C. Euan-Smith. 

1 Vide Ibid 



CHAPTER III. 

?FRANCE AND MOROCCO. 

French interest in Northern Africa was confined until 1881 
to Algeria, which after nearly twenty years' incessant and 
sanguinary fighting had been definitely declared French 
territory in 1848. From that time until 1870 the problems 
•of Algerian administration proved sufficiently intricate and 
^absorbing to keep in check the growth of ambitions in other 
directions. The disasters of the Franco-German war 
^ensured a further period of the maintenance of the 
^status quo in Northern Africa. But with that marvellous 
and rapid recovery which earned the admiration of the 
world, France entered upon a career of colonial activities 
which were to carry her far indeed. 

In this course of action Jules Ferry, who incarnated 
the new colonial spirit, was personally encouraged by 
Bismarck, not, it may well be supposed, from altruistic 
motives, but because the grim German calculated that the 
tnore the interest of the hereditary foe he had overcome was 
immersed in oversea enterprises, the less fiercely would 
'hum the fires of ** La revanche " at home. 

The aspirations of the new colonial party turned west- 
wards towards Morocco and eastwards towards Tunis upon 
w/hich Italian statesmen were casting covetous eyes. The 
-scheme of a great North-West African Empire which 
should in time rival the lost Empire of the Indies, and 
which Prevost-Paradol had, long before, predicted it must 
he France's destiny to found, began to .take firm root. 

In 1881, fearing a previous move by Italy, but on the 
€imsiest of intrinsic pretexts, Tunis was invaded, its ruler 
reduced to the position of a puppet, and French control 
•established. 

There remained Morocco. A long conterminous frontier 
with Algeria, vague and undetermined, offered an excellent 
iDasis for those multifold measures which precede political 
absorption. The opportunities were not neglected. But 
tiere France had to reckon not merely with the Moors them- 
iselves — very different material to handle from the more 

13 



14 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

peaceable inhabitants of Tunis^ — and with a European* 
Power which she could afford to defy, whose claims were- 
no better than her own, but with Britain, with Spain, and 
with Germany. The task confronting her diplomacy was 
very similar to the secular policy of the Moorish Govern- 
ment. While the ingenuity of the latter was exercised in 
playing off one Power against another in order to preserve 
the integrity of his dominions, French diplomacy had to 
bring its designs to fruition by " feeling " the three other 
interested Powers with the purpose of purchasing the 
acquiescence of one or more of them at the* expense of the 
other or others. 

The motives inspiring the French were neither better 
nor worse than those which have animated other nations,, 
or governments, from the remotest times. There will be- 
eternal differences of opinion as to whether the control of 
their destinies by a race advanced in arts and crafts con- 
duces to the happiness and welfare of a race less advanced. 
There will be everlasting disputes as to whether a nation 
in the position of the French, i.e., with no surplus popula- 
tion and not essentially commercial, is strengthened or 
weakened by such enterprises. Assuredly no one dreams 
of blaming France for entertaining ambitious projects; but 
the methods taken to bring them to fruition become a 
matter for detailed discussion when they affect the interests 
of other Powers and international Treaties. 

In its dull and inefficient manner the Moorish Govern- 
ment was fully alive to the intentions of the French, and 
despite the lavish expenditure of money, the activities of 
an admirably organised intelligence department working 
from Algiers, and incessant intrigues at Fez, the French 
cause advanced but slowly. 

It was not until 1901 that under the impulse of an 
energetic Minister, then burning to avenge the final: 
collapse, at Fashoda, of the French challenge to the British 
position in Egypt, and profiting by our embarrassments in 
South Africa, determined to force the pace. The annexa- 
tion of the Tuat oases, threatened in 1891, was proclaimed, 
together with that of Igli and the Zusfana oases. The 
French Minister at Tangier informed the Moorish Govern- 
ment that France would herself take action against the 
periodical invasion of her frontier by roving bands- 
nominally under Moroccan suzerainty, and ** engaging^ 

1 The subjugation of Tunisia was over in two years. 



FRANCE AND MOROCCO 15 

^directly the responsibility of the Moorish Government." 
Providentially (for M. Delcass6) a French subject got him- 
self murdered by a Moor at the psychological moment, and 
the French Minister at Tangier demanded the despatch of 
a couple of French men-o'-war. 

Seized with panic the Sultan sent an embassy to Paris, 
and an agreement was drawn up giving Francp satisfaction 
on a number of points, including assurances as to the peace 
of the frontier. This *' Protocol " was based upon — 

;'* respect for the integrity of the Shereefian Empire on the 
one hand, and, on the other, an improvement in the 
^situation affecting the close neighbourhood {de vpisignage 
'immediat) which exists between them, by all the special 
■arrangements which the said neighbourhood necessitates. "^ 

I On July 2jy 1 90 1, M. Delcasse dotted the i's and crossed 
the t's in a communication to the new Minister at Tangier. 
After referring to the * ' evident proof of the frankly friendly 
feelings towards Morocco " displayed by France according 
to the terms of the " Protocol," M. Delcass6 went on to say 
that France could be, as the Moorish Government should 
decide, ** either the most reassuring of friends or the most 
redoubtable of enemies." Ihen occurs the following 
passage typical of French diplomacy from that period 
onwards : — 

** You should make the Sultan understand that it will 
'depend upon himself to find in us friends the surest, the 
fmost anxious for the integrity of his power, the most' 
capable of preserving him in case of need from certain 
dangers. Our loyalty as also our interest are guarantees 
to him that we shall not encroach upon it. ' '^ 

Thus was heralded the policy of ** pacific penetration." 
The time had not come for France to place her cards upon 
,the table. But it was rapidly approaching.^ 

1 French Yellow Book. 

? Ihid. 

S Vide Chapter IX. 



CHAPTER IV. 

SPAIN AND MOROCCO. 

Centuries upon centuries of strife and enmity ; the scars^ 
of wounds beyond the power of time to heal ; the bitterest 
remembrances of racial hatred and of terrible deeds com- 
mitted on either side; the cumulative memories of a 
struggle lasting for nearly eight hundred years — such is the 
history of Spanish relations with the Moors. It is a strange 
history in the sense that both participants have so curiously 
dwindled in stature. Of the erstwhile splendour of Moorish 
civilisation, only the monuments in Spain, the Alhambra^ 
the Cathedral at Cordova, and so on, remain. The 
grandeur to which a consolidated Spain attained has like- 
wise waned and passed away. While Morocco crumbles- 
into decrepitude and dust, Spain's connection with the land 
of her ancient enemy to-day serves but the temporary uses 
of British insurance against a potential French peril 

Before the events of the past few years, which it is the 
purpose of this volume to narrate, made of Spain a factor 
of some importance in the European dispute over the 
Moorish carcase, her interests in Morocco had fallen to 
vanishing point, although sentimentally the link is still 
powerful enough. The proverbial Spanish pride may still 
have to be reckoned with. 

Apart from their settlement at the Rio del Oro — 
probably so-called because no gold ever came out of it — 
on the Saharan coast of nominal Morocco, and the ensuing 
undefined claim to that coast as far north as Cape Bojador 
with an undelimitated strip of interior sand-dunes, the 
Spaniards possessed in 1900, on the Mediterranean littoral, 
the four presides of Ceuta,i Melilla,^ El Penon de Ve'lez 
de la Gomera,^ and Alhucemas,* plus a small group of 
islands at the mouth of the Muluya, the Zaffarinas. On 

lAn inhospitable, rocky promontory, upon which stands a fort, 
with a tiny strip of land around it. 

2 An island, insignificant in size, with 500 yards of hinterland. 

3 A rock. 

* An island. 

16 



SPAIN AND MOROCCO 17 

the Atlantic coast of Morocco proper the Sultan had con- 
sented to cede to Spain her ancient settlement of Santa- 
Cruz-de-Mar-Pequena, which modern geographers have 
doubtfully identified with Ifni ; useful, perhaps, like the 
settlement at the Rio del Oro further south, to the 
picturesque fishing-boats from the Canary Islands which, 
at certain seasons of the year, make great catches along 
the dreary, surf -bound sea-board of Atlantic Morocco. 

From time to time fierce and purposeless combats had 
taken place with the Riffians round Melilla. Spanish 
honour was apparently satisfied, and possibly the Riffians 
were equally pleased to recall their daring exploits of past 
ages by indulging in powder play. 

A few privileges resulting from ancient treaties, of an 
economic kind, in some of the ports — when one has said 
this, one has said all of Spain's modern concern with 
Morocco, until M. Delcass^, in his anxiety to secure the 
prize, sought to convert her into the instrument of his 
designs. Of this more anon. 



CHAPTER V. 

GERMANY AND MOROCCO. 

If I contribute a little more detail to Germany's interests 
in Morocco it is because the average Englishman appears 
to imagine that she had none at all until the gunboat 
Panther cast anchor, early last July, opposite Agadir,^ and 
that her appearance upon the scene as a contestant was 
purely gratuitous, provocative, and unjustifiable. 
Germany's interest in Morocco is, of course, a modern 
interest, just as United Germany is a modern product, and, 
although, even in Germany's case, research would show 
us old connections and relationships between certain 
German ports and principalities and the Moors, this volume 
is only concerned with the interested Powers and Morocco 
in modern times. 

Two of the foremost explorers of Morocco were 
Germans, Lenz and Rohlfs, and, in the sixties and seven- 
ties, their narratives attracted much attention in Germany, 
especially from the point of view of possible trade develop- 
ment. A German Resident to the Shereefian Government 
was first appointed in 1873. 

Germany not only participated but played an active rSle 
in the first international Conference on the affairs of 
Morocco held at Madrid, and known as the Madrid Con- 
vention, in 1880, and her influence, joined to that of 
Britain, it was which resulted in the most useful outcome 
of that Conference being secured, viz. , the extension of the 
** most favoured nation treatment " (hitherto confined to 
France and Britain) to all nations. Thenceforth inter- 
national trade in Morocco was placed upon an equal footing 
for all countries. It may be usefully emphasised that it 
was this Madrid Convention which made of Morocco a 
problem of international interest. 

In 1887 Germany acquiesced in the tentative proposals 
for a renewed Conference put forward by Spain with the 

1 On the South Atlantic coast of Morocco. 
18 



GERMANY AND MOROCCO 19 

object of improving and amplifying the Madrid Conven- 
tion in sundry respects. Nothing, however, came of these 
proposals. 

In 1889 the Moorish Government sent an embassy to 
Berlin. 

In June, 1890, the German Minister at Fez signed a 
commercial Treaty v^^ith the Moorish Government for five 
years. This Treaty, which was signed at Fez on June i of 
that year, provided that ** commerce will be carried on 
without privilege and will be free for the two contracting 
parties. " It also stipulated that : " the subjects of the two 
parties will have the same rights and advantages as those 
which exist, or may come to exist, as regards subjects of 
the most favoured nation." It is worthy of note that the 
German Government informed the other signatory Powers 
of the Madrid Convention that it would not ratify that 
Treaty unless they gave their adhesion to it. The British 
•Government raised no objection to its ratification, and 
ratified it was. 

In 1892 Germany cordially supported, as we have 
already noted. Sir C. Euan-Smith's Mission to Morocco. ^ 
This co-operation did but perpetuate the spirit of the 
Anglo-German African settlement of July i, 1890, 
characterised as follows by the then German Chancellor, 
Von Caprivi, when attacked for his undue friendliness to 
England : *' We have desired above all to ensure our under- 
-standing with England."^ In this connection it is instruc- 
tive to bear in mind that even at this early period the policy 
of the German Government in regard to Morocco was 
vigorously criticised by the Pan-German party, and the 

l*'The actual dealings between the British Minister and the 
Sultan, who, by the law and practice of Morocco, takes personal 
cognisance of every detail of public diplomatic business, are believed 
to have been amicable, as are those between the Mission and most of 
the other European representatives. Germany, in particular, which 
negotiated the last commercial Treaty in 1890, has supported British 
-diplomacy, and Spain and Italy are stated to have done the same. . . . 
The support of nearly all the interested Powers was accorded very 
freely to the British Envoy ; and it is believed that Count Tattenbach, 
the German Minister, has been especially prominent in supporting the 
British attitude to obtain rights which would benefit all European 
nations/' {Times, July 19, 1892.) 

2 "Our relations with England form one of the most important 
-guarantees for the maintenance of European peace, and our Govern- 
ment cannot support colonial enterprises which, with no benefit to 
Germany, are directed against the interests of England." (North 
Kj^erman Gazette, July, 1890.) 
[2] 



20 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

advanced colonials, who desired that Germany's rSle in 
Morocco should exceed the limits set to it by the German 
Government. This kind of pressure, from jingoes who- 
wished to drag Germany into territorial adventures in 
Morocco, has never been lacking throughout the last 
decade, and now that the problem has been finally settled, 
in a sense, contrary to these aspirations, chagrin, as we 
see, has led to virulent onslaughts. Whether successive 
German Chancellors have invariably displayed the wisest 
tactics in dealing with these influences, only the most inti- 
mate knowledge of the internal difficulties German states- 
men have had to face from these sources would enable an 
opinion to be formed of any value. And that knowledge no 
Englishman possesses. But there can be no serious doubt 
that the German Government and the German Emperor 
have repeatedly disavowed these attempts to force them^ 
into such channels, and have steadily refused to allow their 
Moroccan policy to be deflected from its normal and pro- 
claimed course. 

It can be asserted, without fear of contradiction, that 
not one iota of proof from any quarter has been adduced 
that the rulers of Germany ever formulated or endorsed 
the Avider aims of the German colonials : ever sought or 
laboured for the acquisition of coaling stations, or for a 
share in a dismembered Morocco.^. Considering the 
determined efforts made in recent years to portray the 
policy of the German Government towards the Morocco 
question in the blackest of lights, and the god-send which 
a calculated indiscretion revealing the existence of such 

1 For the utmost that can be said in a contradictory sense the 
reader is referred to a recent article by Diplomaticiis in the Fort- 
nightly Review. The article, which sets out to prove that the German 
Government's fixed idea for years has been the acquisition of a part of 
Morocco, fails to produce anything vi^hatever in the nature of proof. 
On the other hand, it serves the very useful purpose of showing vv'itb 
what obstinacy the German Government resisted the persistent 
agitation of the Pan-German Colonials, who, of course, have con- 
tinuously preached this policy, although opposed by several well-known 
German naval strategists. The article in question appeared before the 
frank admission of the French Foreign Minister in the Chamber in- 
December of la?t year (vide Part VIII.), to the effect that from the 
very outset of the Franco-German negotiations which ensued after the 
Panther's arrival at Agadir, the German Government expressed its 
complete willingness to admit a French Protectorate over Morocco, 
subject to economic pledges and compensation elsewhere — an admission 
which effectually disposes of the whole story, and corroborates from a 
source beyond suspicion, the good faith of the German Government in 
the matter. 



GERMANY AND MOROCCO 21 

designs would have proved to those desirous of scoring- 
off Germany, we may safely assume, I think, that if there 
had been anything- to disclose to this effect, the world would 
certainly have been informed of it. At the same time 
Germany made it perfectly clear, from the first warning 
addressed to M. Delcasse by Prince Radolin, the German 
ambassador at Paris, in June,- 1901, onwards, that she 
stood for an independent Morocco and complete commercial 
equality within it, and when the force of events had com- 
pelled a modification of the first of those desiderata (even 
as they had compelled a change in the identical policy of 
Britain) Germany made it equally plain that she would not 
suffer such a modification without being consulted, and 
without exacting her price. 

That she was intrinsically justified in taking up that 
position has, curious to relate, been more freely acknow- 
ledged in France than it has in England, although the 
official policy of France collided with the German stand- 
point, and although the bitter recollections of a great war 
still cast their shadow over the relations of the two peoples. 
Speaking in the French Parliament ^ M. Deschanel^ 
President of the French Parliamentary Committee on 
Foreign Affairs, in the course of an explanation of the 
reasons which had led the Committee to recommend a rati- 
fication of the Franco-German Convention of November,, 
191 1, by the Chamber, observed — 

*' Could we affect to ignore the efforts of Germany in 
Morocco for half a century, the travels of her explorers, the 
activity of her colonists, her agricultural and mineral 
enterprises, her steamship lines, her post-offices, and 
especially that movement of ideas which gravitated towards 
the Shereefian Empire, not in Pan-German circles and 
colonial committees alone, but in intellectual circles among 
that elite which, to the honour and power of that nation 
where all co-operate for the same ends, prepares the work 
of the diplomatists and soldiers." 

M. Deschanel was right. German interests in Morocco 
have steadily grown during the last ten years, and, 
potentially, are very considerable. They are being assisted 
in every possible way by the German Foreign Office and 
Consular staff, as is the case in South America, and, in fact» 
all over the world. 

1 On December 16, 1911. 



22 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

In the domain of Moroccan finance Germany is a large 
creditor upon Morocco, and a participant to the extent of 
no less than 20 per cent, in the 1910 Loan (as compared 
with France's 40 per cent, and Britain's 15 per cent.) 
negotiated through the Morocco State Bank, in whose 
capital she shares and on whose Board she is represented. 
She is a participant in the- tobacco monopoly, formed as a 
supplementary guarantee to the bondholders of the 1910 
Loan, and is represented on the Board. Through the 
Krupps, the Mannesmanns, and other firms, she holds such 
a preponderating position in the mining interest (at present 
virtually confined to the extraction of iron ore) that the 
German share-capital in the international Union des Mines, 
will, it is understood, be no less than 40 per cent, if and 
when the negotiations now proceeding are finally com- 
pleted. In the share capital of the Societe Marocaine des 
Travaux publiques, whose purpose, as its name implies, is 
the construction of sundry public works in Morocco, 
Germany is represented to the extent of 30 per cent., and 
has four representfttives on the Board. The enlargement 
of the port of Larash is due to German enterprise.^ Upon 
German enterprise^ has devolved the construction of the 
projected harbour works, lighter basin and breakwater at 
Tangier, and also the drainage of that town. German 
enterprises at Tangier include a tobacco factory which 
employs one hundred arid fifty hands, a bank, and a news- 
paper published in German. 

Germany maintains nine Consulates in Morocco, which 
are also entrusted with the defence of Austrian interests. 

The actual volume of German trade is not enormous, 
but has steadily grown, as the under-noted details show,^ 

1 Messrs. Sager and Worner, of Munich. 

2 Messrs. Holzmann & Co., of Frankfurt-on-Maine. 

3 Morocco's commercial statistics are notoriously untrustworthy 
and difficult to ascertain, and the ceaseless alarms and excursions of 
the last three years have greatly interfered with normal trade. Consul 
White's report for 1909 states that German trade retains its rank of 
third on the list, Great Britain being an easy first, and France second. 
The French figures, however, include the trade of the Algerian ports 
with Eastern Morocco, uhich is given on that account as " French," 
■which is misleading, since a portion of the so-called French trade vid 
Algeria is of British and German origin. The totals given in the 
British Consular report for 1909 show an export from Morocco to 
Britain of ;^800,030, to France of ;^629,818, to Germany of ;^339,428. 
Germany's total trade with Morocco for that year is given as 
;^564,147, against ;^2,204,771 for Great Britain, and ;^2,195,109 
(including Algeria) for France. According to the trade statistics of 



GERMANY AND MOROCCO 23 

and she is everywhere actively pushing it as the lamenta- 
tions of French official reports — echoed in the Chamber 

the German Empire, vol. 242, XIV., the following is the table of 
German trade with Morocco for the past ten years in millions of 
marks, but these figures are exclusive of precious metals ; neither do 
they include the German trade with Melilla and the Riff (Spanish 
territory) or the German trade through the Algerian ports, but only the 
direct traflfic with German ports : — 





Exports from 


Exports from 


Total Trade 




Germany to 


Morocco to 


(exclusive of 




Morocco. 


Germany. precious metals) 




(In Thousands of Marks) 


1901 . 


. 3,632 . . 


1,564 . . 


5.196 


1902 . . 


. 3,645 . . 


. 1.438 . . 


5,083 


1903 . . 


. 4,651 . . 


. 1,664 . . 


6,315 


1904 . . 


. 5,677 . . 


. 1,283 . . 


6,860 


1905 . 


. 6,017 . *. 


1,725 . . 


7,742 


1906 . . 


. 6,219 . . 


. 2,131 . . 


8,350 


1907 . . 


. 10,134 . . 


1,673 . . 


11,807 


1908 . . 


. 10,156 . . 


. 2,399 . . 


12,555 


1909 . . 


. 8,589 . . 


, 4,175 . . 


12,764 \ 


1910 . . 


9,634 . 


5,770 . . 


15,404 



From all I can learn German trade is very much more extensive 
than this table would appear to suggest, although the growth it indi- 
cates is in itself considerable. The system pursued in elaborating 
these statistics seems to be thoroughly faulty. Thus, the Swiss, 
Italian, and Hungarian imports and the Italian, Levantine, and 
American exports appear as French or British trade, Marseilles on the 
one hand and Gibraltar on the other being the last (or first, as the 
case may be) port from (or to) which merchandise has been shipped. 
Similarly goods exported to Morocco from West Germany through 
Dutch and Belgian ports appear in the statistics as Dutch and Belgian 
goods ; and goods exported from Morocco to Germany by British and 
Belgian boats vid England and Belgium go to swell the British and 
Belgian trade figures. Then, again, Belgian sugar, Indian tea, etc., 
are consigned to Morocco direct on account of German firms, and, 
once more, figure as either Belgian or British imports. The fact is 
that German trade with Morocco, like that of the British firms, is 
largely international, German and British merchants not merely trad- 
ing with Morocco direct from Germany and Britain, but between 
Morocco and France, England, Spain, America, and Italy. In this 
general world-trade of Morocco the British and the German share is, I 
gather, pretty equally divided, amounting to about 30 per cent., on 
either side, of the total, while 20 per cent, passes through Moorish- 
Jewish houses. In this general trade French trade plays very little 
part indeed. The French possess, however, the largest banking busi- 
ness in Morocco, and have an important place in the local retail busi- 
ness. According to the Berlin publication, Murokko und Persien, the 
local statistics of the two ports of Hamburg and Bremen combined 
show a total turn-over of business with Morocco of 14,940,119 marks in 
1907, and 14,621,166 marks in 1908. It will be seen from these figures 
that Germany plays a very much larger part in the genuine trade of 
Morocco with the outer world than would appear from the statistics 
issued by the British Foreign Office. I have taken a good deal of 
trouble to get at the true facts as regards Morocco's international 



24 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

last December — bear witness- German merchants are to 
be met with in nearly every trade centre, such as Fez, 
Mogador, Marakesh, Agadir, Tangier, Larash, Casa- 
blanca, Saffi, etc. In 1907 the Germans held 40 per cent, 
of the trade of Casablanca, where there are a German bank 
and some fifty German residents. Three German steam- 
ship companies call at Moroccan ports, and in 1907 three 
hundred and twenty-four German vessels, with a combined 
tonnage of 350,777 tons, were registered as having entered 
or cleared at eight Moroccan ports. 

The German post offices are admittedly, I believe, the 
most numerous and best equipped in Morocco. 

German prospectors for minerals are now numerous in 
Morocco, and have penetrated regions supposed for many 
years to be inaccessible to European travellers. 

The importance which Germany attaches to the 
potentialities of mineral enterprises in Morocco is shown in 
the clauses of the recent Convention^ with France and in 
the Exchange of Notes attached thereto. 

trade, and I believe that impartial investigation will confirm in a 
general way the statements made in this footnote. It should be added 
that a number of German firms, such as the Mannesmann Bros., 
Marx & Co. of Hamburg, Victor Sperling of Leipzig, Dorken of 
Gevelsberg, Hauss of Weissenburg, Herrman of Nurnberg, to mention 
a few, have invested a considerable amount of capital in Morocco. Mr. 
Rosher-, who is thoroughly well acquainted with Morocco, records in 
his interesting little booklet, "Light for John Bull on the Morocco 
Question," that ** The Germans hold more land in Morocco paid for in 
cash than all other nations combined, and without massacre or pillage 
they have established industries and performed genuine pacific pene- 
tration." 

I hope that these figures will be borne in mihd by the reader as he 
peruses the singular story developed in this volume. 

1 November 4, 1911. 



MAP I. 



16' 



ENGLISH MILES 



50 lOO 150 too 




A T L A N T I 



SPAIN 

.Cadiz 

_ ibraltar 



AsHcLorArxiEa, 
LarasharELArish' 



U. 



OCEAN 



Mazs 



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Map of Morocco, showing towns and districts mentioned in the text. 



PART III. 



^•l^e Public Law of Europe regulating the international* 
position of Morocco and its violation. 



CHAFTER VI. 

THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS. 

In the last four chapters we have described the relations of 
the chief European nations vAth Morocco prior to the 
Alg-eciras Act. 

We have now to consider the Algeciras Act itself, i.e. 
to say, the Public Law of Europe regulating the inter- 
national position of Morocco. 

We shall then have to examine what alterations had 
■been brought about in the actual position of Morocco since 
that Public Law was framed, and whether those alterations 
had received the sanction of the Powers which framed that 
Public Law. 

The Public Law of Europe regulating the international 
position of Morocco at the time the event mentioned in the 
opening lines of this chapter occurred was known as the 
General Act of Algeciras, framed conjointly by the repre- 
^sentatives of the Sultan of Morocco, and by the 
'representatives of the following Powers in the order given 
under the Act, viz., Germany, Austria, Belgium, Spain» 
the United States, France, Great Britain, Italy, Holland, 
'Portugal, Russia, and Sweden. 

The immediate origin of its promulgation was as 
follows : — 

On May 30, 1905, the Sultan of Morocco had invited 
the Powers^ to a Conference to discuss the reforms which 
the internal State of Morocco required. That Conference^ ' 
had met at Algeciras early in 1906. An Act had been 
drawn up in April, " In the name of God Almighty " — 
■** based upon the threefold principle of the sovereignty and 
independence of his Majesty the Sultan, the integrity of 

1 " On the invitation which had been addressed to them by his 
"Shereefian Majesty . . in order to arrive at an understanding respect- 
ing the said reforms, as well as to examine the means of providing the ' 
resources necessary for their application." (Act of Algeciras.) 

2 Besides the four interested Powers, viz., Britain, France, Spain, 
^nd Germany, the following Powers also signed the Act : Austria, 
Belgium, Italy, Holland, Portugal, Russia, Sweden, and the United 
■States (with reservations). 

27 



28 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

his dominions, and economic liberty without any? 
inequahty." 

The Sultan's representatives having- declared that they 
could not sign the Act with the representatives of the other 
Powers as time would not allow of their receiving the 
Sultan's reply to the points they had thought it necessary 
to refer to him, the Italian Minister at Tangier, as Senior 
Member of the Diplomatic Body at Tangier, had been' 
requested to assume the duty of obtaining the Sultan's- 
ratification and to convey to him : " the great advantages 
which would result for his Empire ..." thereby. ^ 

This request the King of Italy had transmitted to the 
Sultan in the following communication : — 

"Victor Emanuel III., by the grace of God and the 
will of the nation King of Italy, to the most High and 
Mighty Prince His Majesty Abd-el-Aziz, Emperor of 
Morocco. 

** Most High and Mighty Prince, my dear and good 
friend. A Conference having met, by your Majesty's 
invitation, at Algeciras, at which there assembled the 
Representatives of the Powers friendly to your Empire^ 
the decisions reached by common agreement are now 
collated in a General Act to which the signatures of your 
Majesty's Delegates only are wanting, they having wished 
to reserve its acceptance for the high judgment of their 
Sovereign. The Conference have therefore desired, and I 
have most willingly consented, that my Minister accredited 
to your Court, who is also doyen of the Diplomatic Body 
at Tangier, should repair to the presence of your Majesty,, 
should present to your Majesty the General Act which has 
been agreed upon, and, speaking in the name of all the 
■ Powers assembled at Algeciras, should ask for your 
Majesty's adhesion and your Majesty's entire ratification. 

** Your Majesty is aware of the affection which, as a 
tradition bequeathed us by our ancestors, unites me to 
your Majesty's person ; these sentiments and the conviction 
that, by the adoption of the General Act in its entirety, 
much honour will accrue to your Majesty, and incalculable 
good to your Majesty's Empire, make me rejoice that the 
Powers should have intrusted this important duty to my 
Minister, whom I recommend by these presents to your 

1 Act of Algeciras. 



THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS 29 

Majesty's favour. I further wish your Majesty every 
liappiness, while assuring your Majesty of my high esteem 
^nd my unalterable friendship.^ 

*' Given in Rome, the 26th day of April, 1906. 
** Most affectionate and good friend, 

** (signed) Victor Emanuel.'' 

The Sultan had ratified the Act on June 18 as being — 

*** based in the first instance on three principles, namely : 
maintenance of our sovereignty (in the text, * of our 
rsovereign rights ') of the independence of our aforesaid 
Empire, and of economic liberty in the matter of public 
works. '*^ 

The reforms stipulated in the Act affected (a) the 
organisation of the police, (b) the illicit trade in arms, 
{c) the creation of a " Moorish State Bank," (d) an im- 
proved yield of taxes and the creation of new sources of 
revenue, (e) the regulation of the customs and the suppres- 
rsion of fraud and smuggling, (/) the public services and 
public works. They may be summarised here. 

As to the police, the Act provided that a force of from 
2,000 to 2,500 men should be raised " under the sovereign 
-authority of the Sultan, ' ' recruited by the Moorish Govern- 
ment from among Moorish Mohammedans, commanded by 
Moorish chiefs, and distributed among eight ports of com- 
merce ; that from forty-six to sixty French and Spanish 
officers and non-commissioned officers approved by the 
Sultan should be appointed as instructors to assist in the 
organisation of the force for a period of five years ;^ that the 
force should be placed for the same period under a Swiss 
Inspector-General, who would report to the Moorish 
Government, with whom his contract would be entered 
into, a copy of the same, together with a copy of his 
reports, to be communicated to the '* Diplomatic Body " 
at Tangier. 

As to the illicit trade in arms, the Act contained eighteen 
Articles, of which it is unnecessary here to speak except 
the last, which provided that in the ** region adjoining the 

1 The one thing lacking in this effusive message was, it will be 
perceived, an inquiry for his Shereefian Majesty's personal health at 
the moment. ■« 

2 The arrangement was, therefore, due to expire on- June 18, 1911, 
if the period of its duration is reckoned from the date of the Sultan's 
ratification, or in December, 1911, if the period is reckoned from the 
■date of ratification by all the signatory Powers. 



30 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Algerian frontier " the enforcement of the regulations shalli 
be the " exclusive concern of France and Morocco " ; and 
similarly that in the neighbourhood of the Spanish' 
possessions the matter shall be the "exclusive concern of 
Spain and Morocco." 

As to the State Bank, the Act provided that a Bank 
called " The Morocco State Bank " should be established 
with pouter to exercise for forty years certain privileges 
** granted to it by his Majesty the Sultan." The privileges^ 
comprised the sole duties of " disbursing Treasurer of the 
Empire," and the position of '* financial agent of the 
Government," but " v^^ithout prejudice " to the right of the 
Government applying to other banks for its public loans,, 
although with a " right of preference, other conditions 
being equal, over any other " banks. Other provisions on 
this head were that Spanish money should continue to circu- 
late as legal tender : that the Bank should be constituted a 
limited liability company '* subject to the law of France 
governing the matter " : that it should be administered by 
a board consisting of as many members *' as there are 
allotted portions in the initial capital" : that the German 
Imperial Bank, the Bank of England, the Bank of Spain, 
and the Bank of France should each appoint a Censor : 
that the Moroccan Government should exercise " its high 
control over the Bank^ through a Moorish High Commis- 
sioner." 

As to the improved yield of taxes and the creation of 
new sources of revenue, the most important provisos of the 
Act were that as soon as the tertib^ tax was regularly 
enforced upon Moorish subjects, the subjects of the Powers 
settled in Morocco should also pay it : that foreigners 
should be free to acquire real property throughout the 
Empire^ : that taxes might be imposed on town buildings 
on Moorish and foreign propiietors without any distinc- 
tion : that in regard to the complaint of the Moorish 
Government that foreigners held Moorish Crown lands 
without regular title-deeds or revisionary contracts, an 
equitable settlement should be effected between the 

IThe capital of the Bank is /r616,000 divided into 30,800 shares of 
;^20 each. The capital is distributed into fourteen parts, each part 
consisting of 2,200 shares. Twelve of these parts are held by the 
twelve participating Powers, Mesrs. Glyn, Mills, Currie & Co. repre- 
senting the British group, and Mendelsohn & Co. the German group. 
A number of French banks hold the remaining two parts. 

2 A tax imposed, in lieu of the old Koranic taxes, upon arable land ; 
fruit trees, and cattle. It is unpopular on religious and other grounds. 

5 A reform vainly urged by Sir C. Euan-Smith. 



i 



THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS 31 

Diplomatic Body and **the Special Commissioner whonT 
his Shereefian Majesty may be pleased to appoint " : that 
2^ per cent, customs duty should be imposed upon foreign 
goods, the revenue thus obtained to be expended on 
'* public works undertaken for the development of naviga- 
tion and trade generally in the Shereefian Empire," the 
programme and execution of these works to be settled by 
agreement between the " Shereefian Government and the 
Diplomatic Body at Tangier " : that export duties on cer- 
tain articles should be reduced : that a general coasting 
trade should be authorised : that any modifications in these 
and kindred provisions must be arrived at between the 
Moorish Government and the Diplomatic Body at Tangier. 

The regulations as to customs and suppression of fraud 
and smuggling it is unnecessary to detail, but they 
provided inter alia for the creation of a mixed Customs 
Valuation Committee and a Mixed Customs Committee. 
On the French and Spanish frontiers the application of 
the regulations as to cases of illicit trade in arms was 
exclusively left to the Moorish and French and Spanish 
Governments respectively. 

As to the public services and the construction of public 
works, the Act declared that in no case should the rights 
of the " State over the public services of the Shereefian 
Empire be alienated for the benefit of private interests" : 
if the Moorish Government had recourse to foreign capital 
or industries in connection with the public services or public 
works, the Powers undertook to see that ** the control of 
the State over such large undertakings of public interest 
remain intact ' ' : tenders * ' without respect to nationality ' ' 
should regulate all 'orders for public works or the furnish- 
ing of supplies : no specification for tenders should contain 
either ''explicitly or implicitly any condition or provision 
of a nature to violate the principle of free competition or ta 
place the competitors of one nationality at a disadvantage 
as against the competitors of another " : regulations as to 
contracts should be drawn up by the Moorish Government 
and the Diplomatic Body at Tangier. 

The concluding Article (123) read as follows : — 

"All existing Treaties, Conventions, and Arrange- 
ments between the signatory Powers and Morocco remain 
in force. It is, however, agreed, that in case their provi- 
sions be found to conflict with those of the present general 
Act, the stipulations of the latter shall prevail." 



32 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Such, then, had been the Public Law of Europe 
regulating the international position of Morocco since 
June i8, 1906. 

Two Powers, France and Germany, had since that date 
signed a Declaration between them concerning Morocco, 
•on February 8, 1909. It is advisable to give the text of 
this Declaration in full, if only because it has been cited 
(mirabile dictu!) as an arrangement whereby Germany 
undertook to recognise in advance any action in Morocco it 
might please P>ance to adopt. 

Franco-German Declaration respecting Morocco 
(February 8, 1909). 

The Government of the French Republic and the 
Imperial German Government, being equally anxious to 
facilitate the execution of the Algeciras Act, have agreed to 
define the meaning which they attach to the articles of that 
Act with a view to avoid in the future all sources of mis- 
understanding between them. 

Therefore, 

The Government of the French Republic, firmly attached 
to the maintenance of the independence and integrity of 
the Shereefian Empire, being resolved to safeguard the 
principle of economic equality, and, consequently, not to 
obstruct German commercial and industrial interests in 
that Country ; 

And the Imperial German Government, pursuing only 
economic interests in Morocco, recognising on the other 
hand that the special political interests of France in that 
country are closely bound up with the consolidation of 
order and internal peace, and being resolved not to impede 
those interests ; 

Declare that they do not pursue nor encourage any 
measure of a nature to create in their favour or in that of 
any Power an economic privilege, and that they will 
endeavour to associate their nationals in affairs for which 
the latter may obtain a concession. 

Jules Cambon. 
Kiderlen-Waechter. 

It will be seen, therefore, that this Declaration, while 
in itself implying on the part of France the admission of a 
very special German interest in the Moroccan question ; and 
while in itself implying on the part of Germany a recog- 
aiition of very special French interests in the Moroccan 



THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS 33 

question, did not in the least modify or affect the Act of 
Algeciras. It merely indicated that the two Powers treated 
one another on a footing of equality in their discussions on 
the subject of their joint and several concerns in facilitating 
the execution of the Act. 

Our first question is thus answered. The integrity of 
Morocco and the independence of its Government had been 
solemnly proclaimed by the Powers. Discussions centreing 
round the application and execution of the reforms, even- 
tually agreed upon between the Powers and the Moorish 
Government, were to be conducted by representatives of 
the Sultan on the one part, and by the diplomatic repre- 
sentatives in Morocco of the Powers on the other, and this 
control of the foreign Diplomatic Body as a whole was 
even made to apply to the working in eight ports of the 
Police force, in which a limited number of French and 
Spanish officers, under a Swiss Inspector-General, were to 
serve as inspectors. Only in matters such as the illicit 
traffic in arms and contraband were two European Powers 
— France and Spain — authorised to act with the Moorish 
Government independently of the General Diplomatic 
Body, and then only on the frontiers of their respective 
possessions. 

Whether, in practice, the programme was, as a whole, 
workable or whether it wks not, the fact remains that it 
was the programme which the Powers had themselves 
elaborated, and in which the Sultan had concurred. 



43J 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE CRUCIAL ARTICLE OF THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS. 

" Nothing less than a general renunciation of all rights to individual' 
interference on any pretext in the affairs of Morocco and a common 
agreement collectively to require the reforms so much needed, will ever 
accomplish the regeneration of the Moorish Empire. In face of such a 
united demand, with offers of support if needed, no refusal could be 
expressed, and provided that too much was not asked at once, and 
capable advisers were found, these reforms might be as peacefully 
carried out as under the English in Egypt. But will Europe make 
this possible? "1 

** All existing Treaties, Conventions, and Arrangements^ 
between the signatory Powers and Morocco remain in 
force. It is, however, agreed that, in case their provisions 
he found to conflict with those of the present General Act, 
the stipulations of the latter shall prevail/' 

This, as we have seen, was the 123rd and concluding 
Article of the Act of Algeciras. 

Continuing the prosecution of our inquiry in the 
Socratic manner, what, let us ask, could the final and 
italicised sentence of the above Article mean? All through- 
the Act of Algeciras there runs one continual refrain — 
coupled with insistence upon the collective control of the 
Diplomatic representatives of the Powers at Tangier^ — 
viz., the integrity and independence of Morocco. The 
preamble explicitly declares that the reforms embodied in 
the Act are * * based upon the sovereignty and independence 
of the Sultan and the integrity of his dominions." The 
Police force is placed under the sovereign authority of the 
Sultan ; the nomination of the foreign Officers are to be 
submitted to the Sultan; the foreign Inspector-General 
reports to the Sultan and to the Diplomatic Body at 

1 Budgett Meakin, "The Moorish Empire," 1899. 

2 Except in regard to the illegal traffic in arms and smuggling on- 
the French and Spanish frontiers. 

34 



THE ESSENCE OF THE ACT 35 

Tangier. Even in the matter of the control of the State 
Bank, the Sultan's dignity and position are alike pointedly 
emphasised and international Censors are appointed. In 
the Articles dealing with improvements in the taxation and 
methods of raising revenue, the discussion and application 
of these reforms are left to the Moorish Government and to 
a majority vote of the Diplomatic Body ; and similarly the 
regulations affecting changes in the Customs. The question 
we have asked admits, therefore, of but one reply. In 
laying down that no provisions existing in precedent 
treaties, conventions, or arrangements between the 
signatory Powers and Morocco should be allowed to prevail 
over the stipulations of the Act, the Powers laid down that 
no change in the political status of Morocco as declared in 
the Act should take place without their consent. On the 
face of it. Article 123 gave to any Power or Powers 
signatory to the Act the right of objecting to any such 
change. On the face of it, Article 123 made it incumbent 
upon any Power or Powers desirous of changing that status 
to obtain the consent of the other signatory Powers. This, 
moreover, was quite unquestionably accepted in the Report 
of the French Parliamentary Committee appointed by -the 
Chamber to draw up a report on the Algeciras Act. M. 
Hubert, the Reporter, points out that the Act, while 
abolishing none of the antecedent conventions, must be held 
to predominate over them in the event of a dispute. The 
Act, he goes on to say, has the character of a Charter 
imposed upon Morocco, and postulates as its essential basis 
what the Reporter describes as the " traditional " (!) 
French policy of the sovereignty of the Sultan and integrity 
of his dominions. The Reporter goes on to recognise that 
the Madrid Conference of 1880 *' made of Morocco an inter- 
national question/' The importance of this admission, 
however obvious, will appear later. 

It was important to bring this out clearly, for, as the 
narrative proceeds, we shall find that Article 123 is the 
true basis upon which the German case reposes, and what- 
ever views may be entertained as to the manner in which 
Germany has urged her case or as to her motives in urging 
it, the solid fact remains that in holding out as long as she 
could for an independent and territorially inviolate 
Morocco, Germany's position has been based upon the 
Public Law of Europe, and has been intrinsically unshak- 
able on that account. That in doing so Germany pursued 
her own national interest ; that in doing so she was no more 



36 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

concerned than were the other Powers in upholding 
Moroccan independence, from any altruistic considerations 
towards the Moors and their Ruler, such as might have 
inspired a united Europe animated by the high ideals 
described in Mr. Budgett Meakin's words at the head of 
this chapter; that she finally abandoned her position for 
compensations elsewhere — these things cannot impair the 
fundamental legality of her attitude. 

Had the rdles been reversed ; had British interests, in 
the opinion of those charged with defending them, lain in 
the direction in which Germany's interests lay during the 
years succeeding the Conference at Algeciras ; had the 
policy of Britain in 1907-11 been concerned, as it was 
between 1880 and 1900, to maintain an independent 
Morocco, Britain would have urged her case upon precisely 
the same ground as Germany has urged hers, and those 
who have denounced Germany for doggedly sticking to 
the stipulations of the Act, would have been employed in 
denouncing her for allowing them to be violated. But 
on its merits Britain's case would have been equall} 
linansvv^erable. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE PROGRESSIVE VIOLATION OF THE ACT OF ALGECIRAS 

IN BRIEF. 

We have now to consider what alterations between 
June, 1906, and July, 1911, had been brought about in 
the position of Morocco, i.e., since the Public Law of 
Europe regulating its international position was framed, 
and whether those alterations had received the sanction, of 
the Powers which framed that Public Law. 

The answer can be given in a single sentence. In the 
five years which had elapsed since its ratification by the 
Sultan, the Algeciras Act had been, in effect, although 
without international sanction, torn across and reduced to 
waste paper, partly as the result of internal conditions in 
Morocco, mainly as the external result of the political 
action of France concurred in by Britain (and to a lesser 
degree of Spain) combined with the operations of inter- 
national finance exercised through the medium of the 
French Government, to which the internal condition of 
Morocco was in the largest measure due. The circum- 
stances under which the changed state of affairs had been 
brought about rnust be briefly outlined at this stage in our 
inquiry. They will be referred to more fully later on.^ 

The young Sultan — :Abdulaziz-ben-Hassan — ^was well- 
meaning, but extravagant and unpopular. He had become, 
to a great extent, Europeanised, and, in a national sense^; 
debauched, by those whose interest it was to debauch him.. 
Moreover, he had already contracted^!. e. , before the. Act 
of Algeciras — heavy cash liabilities. In the course of 1903 
he had borrowed ;^8oo, 000 from French, Spanish, and 
British syndicates. In the summer of 1904 these loans had 
been paid off, but only at the price of contracting a mucli 
heavier liability towards France alone, amounting to 
;^2, 500,000, bearing interest at 5 per cent. I say towards 
France alone advisedly, because the loan was confined td 

I Vide Chapter XVI L 

■■. 37' ' ' ■■ :' . 



38 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

French banking establishments^ and practically forced upon 
Abdulaziz by M.Delcassd. According to M. Jaur^s' un- 
challenged statement made in the French Chamber on 
March 24 last year,^ the emission of this loan was attended 
by such clever manoeuvring on the part of the French banks 
that Morocco actually obtained ;^i,92o,ooo (forty-eight 
million francs), the Banks made a profit of ;^5oo,ooo on the 
transaction, Morocco paying interest on the full amount, of 
course. To secure the interest on this loan the Sultan had 
been induced to consent to set aside 60 per cent, of the 
Customs receipts, which virtually gave France control over 
the Customs to that extent. Further smaller loans and 
liabilities were contracted in various directions during 1905 
and 1906. A proportion of these monies was expended in 
purchasing guns and ammunition from the great French 
manufacturing house of war material, Le Creusot, in order 
to crush tribal risings which were becoming increasingly 
frequent, especially in the neighbourhood of the Algerian 
frontier. Indeed, there seems to have been a close connec- 
tion between the willingness of French finance to oblige 
Abdulaziz and the willingness of Abdulaziz to oblige 
Creusot on the one hand, and the willingness of the tribes 
in closest proximity to the Algerian-Moroccan frontier to 
play the game both of French finance and Creusot on the 
other. It was not surprising under these circumstances 
that various Pretenders should have arisen in Morocco and 
that the authority of the Sultan should have become more 
than habitually undermined. 

But all this was merely a preparatory disturbance in the 
growing womb of the future. 

On March 22, 1907, a Frenchman had been murdered 
at Marakesh, a town in the far interior of Southern 
Morocco. France had immediately used this regrettable 
incident as a pretext for invading Moorish territory and 
occupying the town of Udja and neighbourhood, situate 
just over the Algerian boundary. There she had remained 
(despite frequent pledges to evacuate the place), the first 
step in the process of infringing the integrity of Morocco. 

The next step in the process had been far more com- 
prehensive. A Franco-Spanish syndicate had obtained 
a concession for building a railway from Casablanca, an 
important trading town on the Atlantic coast of Morocco. 

lAlI the leading French and French Colonial banks participated^ 
^Journal Officiel. 



INVASION AND ITS PRICE 39 

Outside and to the East of Casablanca lay a vast Moorish 
cemetery of great antiquity. Through this cemetery the 
company, despite local protests, determined to drive their 
line. A collision occurred between the population and the 
European workmen in the company's employ, in the course 
of which several of the latter were killed. This led to a 
confused melee inside and outside of Casablanca. The 
French thereupon bombarded Casablanca^ and overran the 
whole of the extensive Shawiya district which lay behind it. 
Further and sanguinary fighting involving the slaughter of 
a great number of Moors took place. ^ 

French troops settled down in the occupation both of 
Casablanca, of Rabat, another important coast-town north 
of Casablanca, and of the entire Shawiya district, and 
there, notwithstanding repeated public pledges to evacuate, 
they had remained (and remain). 

The integrity of Moroccan territory had gone by the 
board. 

The financial strangulation of Morocco had thereupon 
been resumed. France presented the Moorish Government 
with a bill of ;^2 ,400,000 for the expenses she had incurred 
by her own conduct in seizing Moroccan territory and 
killing thousands of the Sultan's subjects. A further bill 
was presented embodying the claims for compensation for 
losses suffered by European and Moorish merchants 
through the bombardment of Casablanca ! Morocco had 
to pay that too !^ 

**The incalculable good to your Majesty's Empire'* 
which the King of Italy as mandatory of Christian Europe 
(through his representative), to secure the Sultan's ratifica- 
tion of the Act of Algeciras, had assured the Sultan would 
accrue to him as the result of his acceptance of that Act, 
was, as will be seen, already in a fair way of being realised. 

The natural consequence of these cumulative occur- 
rences had been an outburst of fury against Abdulaziz, 
which was to cost him his throne. Mulai-Hafid, his 
brother, was proclaimed Sultan at Fez on January 4, 
1908. Morocco became rent with civil war. In August, 

1 Thousands of Moors were killed in Casablanca alone. 

2" La pacification du pays des Choouias a fait couler beaucoup de 
sang." (M. Augustin Bernard, at the North African Congress held in 
Paris in October, 1908.) Spain co-operated in the Casablanca opera- 
tions ; but her co-operation was. merely nominal. 

3 They were eventually settled for £522,78^. 



40 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

1908, Abdulaziz was decisively and finally defeated by his 
brother's forces. 

Almost at once international finance, used by the 
French Government as a convenient lever, had dug its 
talons afresh into now dying Morocco. (Spain also 
undertook a small campaign against the tribes near Melilla 
and presented a bill for ;^240,ooo.) France had pressed 
the Sultan to contract another loan. After innumerable 
intrigues all liabilities contracted since the consolidated 
French loan of 1904 were merged into a ;^4,040,ooo loan — 
secured upon various sources of Moorish revenue, including 
the remaining 40 per cent, of the Customs — by an inter- 
national syndicate in which France held the lion's share. 
Morocco's indebtedness to Europe by the autumn of 1910 
was thus ;^6,520,ooo ! 

This loan, like the previous one, was literally forced 
upon the Sultan. It was negotiated outside the Sultan 
altogether, insult being added to injury through the 
nomination by France as so-called guardian of Morocco's 
interests of . . . . . a Coptic journalist ! Mulai- 
Hafid refused to ratify the agreement, and only yielded in 
the face of a French ultimatum. The French interest in 
the loan was 40 per cent. , the German 20 per cent. , the 
British 15 per cent., the Spanish 15 per cent., the balance 
being distributed among other countries. The bonds, of 
500 francs, were issued to the public at 485 francs, and in 
Berlin and Madrid were many times over-applied for. 
According to M. Jaur^s' unchallenged statement in the 
French Chamber on March 24 last year, the participating 
French banks were allowed to take up the bonds at 435 
francs, the public was not permitted to come in at all even 
at 485 francs, and in the afternoon of the day of issue the 
bonds went up to 507 francs. The remaining 40 per cent, 
of the Customs, certain harbour dues, and the tobacco 
monopoly were mortgaged as security for the bondholders 
— thus depriving the Moorish Government of all its 
resources save those which it might succeed in raising by 
direct taxation. The loan itself the Sultan could not touch, 
for it was already earmarked to pay off Morocco's previous 
debts. 

In order to carry on the machinery of Government, 
indeed to keep up any form of native Government at all, 
the unfortunate Sultan had no alternative but to spend his 
remaining strength in wringing tribute by vic^ence froms 



DESTRUCTION OF SULTAN'S AUTHORITY 41 

the tribes. By this time he had become a helpless puppet 
in the hands of France, and the exactions and cruelties to- 
which he was driven in order to make both ends meet, 
resulted in the last vestige of his authority being flung off. 
His surrender to the European financial octopus was 
described by the Times Tangier Correspondent as having 
" humbled " his " arrogance in the eyes of Europe and of 
his own people/' A few weeks later we find the same 
Correspondent exclaiming that the "greater part of the 
country has been driven almost desperate by Mulai-Hafid's 
exactions." But w^hat else could have been expected? 
What else, it may be added, was desired? It was merely 
the operation of cause and effect. Europe had emptied his 
exchequer and prevented him from refilling it. He was 
faced with an ever-increasing anarchy and with the 
desertion of the troops he could no longer pay. And all 
the while, France pressed her ** reforms" and extended 
the area of her military occupation. The condition of 
Morocco became absolutely chaotic, and the Sultan, unable 
to fight, unable to rule, unable to move, finally appealed to 
France. The French were only too ready to oblige ! 

In April, 1910, General Moinier, at the head of 30,000 
troops, had marched upon Fez, meeting with little or no 
opposition, occupying Mequinez and other places en route, 
and had finally entered the capital, where he proceeded to 
settle down. 

Spain, alarmed at the now open consummation of 
French designs, had, despite French protests, proceeded 
on her part to occupy Larash and El Kasr, the former an 
important seaport on the North Atlantic coast of Morocco, 
the latter an important inland place in the Gharb, and also 
Ifni^ on the South Atlantic coast, and had flung 20,000 men 
into the Riff (Mediterranean Morocco). 

Such was the position when Germany sent the Panther 
to anchor off Agadir, neither landing a man, nor occupying 
a yard of territory, still less shooting down a single Moor;: 
but intimating to the world that she did not propose to 
allow the Act of Algeciras to be set aside through the actioD 
of France and Spain without discussion. 

Before considering the step taken by Germany and its 
international effects, our inquiry must be directed towards 
ascertaining how it has come about that the Public Law 
of Europe affecting Morocco, embodied in the Algeciras 

1 Vide Chapter IV. 



42 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Act, has been so flagrantly set aside, and why the British 
Government in particular has been the passive spectator 
not only of the violation of an Act ratified by Britain, but 
of the systematic destruction of the independence and 
integrity of Morocco, which for long years it had been the 
traditional policy of successive British Governments to 
prevent. 

To do this we must unravel the history of the events 
leading up to the Conference of Algeciras, and display in 
their unattractive nakedness those complicated evolutions 
which, when the destinies of nations are concerned, go by 
the name of diplomacy, and whereby the happiness, the 
prosperity, and the lives of millions of men and women are 
often placed in deadly peril without their knowledge or 
consent. 



PART IV. , 



The Antecedents of the AxA <d A^gedras. 



I 



CHAPTER IX. 

FRENCH POLICY TOWARDS THE MOORISH GOVERNMENT, 
1 900- 1 903. 

Notwithstanding the failure of Sir C. Euan-Smith's 
Mission in 1892 — owing-, as we have seen,^ to French 
intrigue — Great Britain continued to enjoy greater moral 
influence in Morocco than any other Power. The Moors, 
at any rate the ruling classes, dislike all Europeans, but 
they, nevertheless, trusted us, because they knew that we 
stood between them and French absorption. They were 
aware that we had no designs on their country, and that 
we treated them fairly in commercial matters. For the 
French they entertained both fear and hatred. The cause 
of this fear was obvious enough, and hatred went along 
with it, heightened by recollections of the past. The long 
and bloody struggle between the French and Abd-el-Kadr 
had had its repurcussion among his co-religionists in 
Morocco, whence, at one period in the contest, the Arab 
patriot had drawn many recruits : certain incidents in that 
5truggle,^ such as the forging of Abd-el-Kadr's Seal, 
whereby the French forces gained a passage through the 
*' Iron Gates," and the tragedy of the caves on Dahra 
plains had never been forgotten. After ourselves, but a 
long way after, came the Germans in Moorish estimation, 
owing to their honest commercial methods, their habit of 
paying for land in cash, and their genuine enterprise free 
from political intrigue. Later on, when the Moors found 
themselves left to French devices by Britain, it was to 
Germany, as we shall see, that they turned for help,^ only 
to be forsaken when it no longer became Germany's 
interest to protect their independence,* which, however, it 
is but fair to add Germany could only have then defended 
at the cost of a European war. 

1 Vide Chapter II. 

2 For an impartial account of these episodes, and the general story 
of the Franco- Algerian Wars, see Sanderson's " Africa in the Nine- 
teenth Century." 

3 1905-1910, especially in 1905. Vide Chapter XVII. 
*i9ii. 

45 



46 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Absorbed in wider schemes of African conquest in the- 
western and central equatorial regions, France had not 
forced the pace in Morocco during the seven years follow- 
ing the failure of the Euan-Smith Mission. The 
recrudescence of her activity was contemporaneous witb 
the prolongation of the Boer War. In 1900 she annexed 
the Tuat oases/ to which Morocco laid nominal claim. Id 
1901 she signed a treaty of friendship with the Moorish 
Government, followed by M. Delcass^'s formal declaration 
of attachment to Moorish integrity and independence given 
in Chapter III. In 1902^ a further arrangement was signed, 
on the same lines, accompanied by the same assurances and 
especially concerned with ensuring peace in the continually 
troubled Moroccan-Algerian frontier region. By Article I. 
of this arrangement the Moorish Government undertook 
to— 

** consolidate its authority by every possible means 
throughout its territory from the mouth of the Kiss to- 
Figig." 

The French Government undertook, for its part, to- 
assist the Moorish Government, if necessary, in the task. 
Article I. further provided that — 

** The French Government will establish its authority 
and peace in the regions of the Sahara, and the Moorish 
Government, its neighbour, will assist by every means in- 
its power.'* 

The establishment of ** mixed Franco-Moorish 
markets" in the frontier regions, and mutual assistance in- 
the collection of customs dues were also stipulated in the 
arrangement. In other words, there was to be Franco- 
Moorish control in the vague undetermined region border- 
ing the common frontier which, from time immemorial^ 
raiding bands had crossed and recrossed in search of 
plunder; a system of ** dual and mutual support." Such- 
was French policy in appearance, and very possibly in^ 
intention at that time, at least among some of the govern- 
ing elements in France; but not, undoubtedly, in con- 
formity with the views either of the French Colonial Party 
in Paris or of the forward school in Algeria. At the close 
of that year (1902) Abdulaziz began contracting his loans 
upon the French market. ^ In April, 1903, M. Loubet, the 

lAt a cost to the French tax-payer which, by 1910, had reached 
;^2,4oo,ooo, vide Colonial Budget Report for that year : the occupation; 
was then costing ;^i4o,ooo per annum for a total trade of ;^6o,ooo. 

2 April 20. 

3 Vide Chapter VIII. 



OUlWARi; FRIENDLINESS 47 

President of the French Republic, paid a visit to Algiers^ 
and the Sultan despatched a special Mission to Algiers ta 
salute him. The Yellow Book gives the speech delivered 
by the Moorish envoy, of which the following sentence may 
be quoted as crystallising, in Moorish eyes, the policy 
embodied in the friendly arrangements of 190 1 -1902 — 

'* To increase the prosperity of the two neighbouring 
countries (Algeria and Morocco), to develop and improve 
their relations, to extend their trade by reciprocal penetra- 
tion, and definitely to establish peace and security in the 
frontier region, such is the object we are pursuing, and 
which does not appear impossible of attainment between 
two countries naturally united by their geographical 
positions, and which are destined mutually to help and 
assist each other." 

Writing at the time of the Algeciras Conference, a 
French author of repute, whose vigorous attacks upon- 
Germany absolve him from any charge of Ze^e-patriotism^ 
but who, like many other Frenchmen, blames the precipi- 
tate transformation of a policy of honest and progressive 
influence exercised from outside, and consistent with 
formal and reiterated pledges, into one of aggression and 
intrigue — M. Berard — tells us that the Moorish envoy 
expected M. Loubet to confirm his previous words which 
had had the effect of lulling Moorish suspicions of French 
designs. Those words referred to * * a formal guarantee of 
territorial and sovereign authority, of Moroccan integrity, 
of the Moorish Government's independence, neither 
invasion, nor annexation, nor Tunisification, but the system 
of * dual and mutual ' support." To this repeated assur- 
ance, says M. Berard, the Moorish envoy was to have 
answered that — 

** Satisfied with French friendship and needing no 
further guarantee, since Morocco had no other (European) 
neighbour, Morocco would no longer require to lean upon 
other Powers for the proclamation and the maintenance of 
Morocco integrity."^ 

** If only this exchange of promises had taken place," 
comments M. Berard, " how much easier the work of the 
Conference would have been to-day." 

1 The substance of this proposed pubHc exchange of pledges was 
discussed between the Sultan and the French representative at Fez — 
doubtless with the authority of Paris — as an inducement for the former 
to send a special mission to greet M. Loubet 



48 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

But M. Loubet disappointed the Sultan's expectations. 
He gave no such pledge, contenting himself with a few 
pleasant common-places. The influences in France and in 
Algeria inimical to the policy consecrated in the arrange- 
ments of 1901-1902 had become too strong, as events in 
Algeria and in Morocco were speedily to demonstrate. Up- 
risings against the Sultan's authority had again occurred 
on the Morocco side of the Algerian frontier, and two 
months after the Loubet interview Figig was bombarded 
by orders of the Governor-General of Algeria, thereby 
ruining the prestige of the Sultan in a district recognised as 
Moorish by the arrangement of 1901. The General com- 
manding the French troops informed the leading men of 
the place after the bombardment that France was not con- 
cerned in the dispute between the Sultan and his subjects, 
thereby further damaging the Sultan's authority. From 
that time onwards the influence of Algiers succeeded step 
by step in negativing the efforts made by the French repre- 
sentative at Fez, who desired to uphold the spirit of the 
arrangements of 1901 and 1902. None of the stipulations 
of the agreement in regard to mutual assistance in preserv- 
ing order and collecting customs revenues were kept. The 
Sultan's authority suffered humiliation after humiliation. 
Incessant demands came from Algiers to Paris for 
** energetic action" and incitements for further military 
displays. 

So far the contents of this chapter have wholly been 
taken from French sources. From British sources worthy 
of credence it has been constantly asserted that the 
*' stirring up " of the tribes on the Algerian-Moroccan 
frontier partook then, and since, of the nature of a fixed 
policy on the part of the French authorities in Algiers. 

So much for the characteristics which marked the 
•recrudescence of French activity in Morocco itself from 
1900 to 1903. On the European stage French diplomacy 
was engaged in preparing the way for the first ** combina- 
tion " contemplated by M. Delcass^, viz., a Franco-Spanish 
protectorate accompanied, there is some reason to suppose, 
by formal guarantees of an economic order towards 
Germany to ensure her neutrality in the transaction, but 
to the total exclusion of Britain, which ** for twenty years " 
— in the words of M. Andr6 Tardieu — ** had been in 
Morocco our (France's) most redoubtable adversary."^ 

lAt the National African Congress, held in Paris, October, 1908. 



MAP II. 



16° 



^°. 



49 ENCHJSH MILES 



CS.Vincerrt 



so too ISO zoo zso 




ATLANTIC 



C.Spartel 






AstZcLorJrxJla. 



P. 



OCEAN 



Safi orAsfl fe A B DA -# 



Mo^ad<n> ar/s H i ad M a 
5"ueirac 



CANARY ISLANDS 

Canzarate 






Aredfc' 



SMariqSI Fuerteventura X 




SHAWIA .Kvt^-S»3r / M 

ss^ •■■■ ■" 

TAFJLELT 



-^ i Taina|rut 

V 








juby^ 



^j>j0^h^'' 



r /•■ 



RIO BE ORO 






28" 



12° 



Stanfbrdi' Geoyf-Estai^ London.. 



Map of Morocco illustrating the Sphere recognised to Spain under the 
Franco-Spanish secret Convention of October, 1904, which remained secret 
until published in the Paris Matin in November, 191 1. 



bLt . 



CHAPTER X, 
M. delcasse's attempt to partition morocco with 

SPAIN^ 1 900- 1 903. 

The cynicism of a certain school of diplomacy has seldom 
been better illustrated than in M. Delcass^'s public pro- 
fessions towards Morocco in igoi and 1902, and his 
concurrent secret negotiations with Spain. To moralise 
upon it would be superfluous. Not to profit by the lesson 
it conveys would be foolish. However easily it can at times 
be led astray upon international affairs, Public Opinion 
in Britain is essentially a healthy one, and so much 
prejudiced nonsense has been written during the past twelve 
months on the relative straightforwardness of French and 
German diplomatic methods that, apart from its historical 
interest, this particular chapter of the Moroccan affair is 
worthy of the most careful attention by Englishmen. 

Having insured himself (in 1900) against any possible 
trouble on the Italian side by giving Italy a free hand in 
Tripoli so far as France was concerned, M. Delcasse pro- 
posed to Spain the following year a partition of Morocco. 
To what extent Germany may have been cognisant of the 
scheme is as yet unrevealed. Possibly there is nothing to 
reveal. Certain indications, however, would seem to sug- 
gest the contrary, but as no public documents are accessible 
— at least to the writer's knowledge — which would throw 
light upon the subject, it seems useless to wander in 
the domain of speculation and surmise. The nature of 
the negotiations with Spain was, however, placed beyond 
all doubt by the speeches of the Duke de Almovodar del Rio, 
the Foreign Minister in the Sagasta Cabinet,^ and of Sefior 
Maura, the then Premier, in the Spanish Cortes, in June, 
1904, two months after the conclusion of the Anglo-French 
*' Declaration." The story as disclosed by these high 
personages and by the publication of Seilor Silvela's^ letter 

1 March, 1901, to December 6, 1902. 

2 Premier from December 7, 1902, to December 5, 1903. 

49 



50 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

to the Duke de Almovodar del Rio in the Imparcial on 
June lo,^ was as follows : — 

The scheme submitted to the Sagasta Cabinet by 
M. Delcass6 proposed a division of Morocco in the follow- 
ing- manner : Spain was to obtain North Central Morocco, 
including Fez and Taza, and the North A^tlantic Coast, 
France the remainder. The negotiations begun in the 
summer of 1901, continued all that year, and were 
prosecuted throughout 1902. M. Delcasse's main idea 
was to settle the Moroccan question once and for all, and 
behind the back of Great Britain, and the fact was not 
concealed in the debates to which I am alluding. Senor 
Sagasta hesitated a long time, and during the late summer 
and autumn of 1902 M. Delcasse pressed the Spanish 
ambassador in Paris repeatedly to hasten the proposed 
solution, promising that the " diplom.atic support " of 
France would be assured to Spain in case of difficulties with 
a third Power. At the end of September it seemed as 
though the matter were going through, and the Treaty was 
put into final shape. In "December Senor Sagasta suddenly 
resigned, and his successor, Sefior Silvela, who, when in 
Opposition, as he himself admits in his letter to the Duke 
de Almovodar del Rio, had been taken into the fullest 
confidence of the Sagasta Cabinet, and had at one time 
approved the project, refused to ratify the Treaty, and 
broke off the negotiations. 

What had happened? The explanation was explicitly 
and impficitly avowed in the Cortes, and in Senor Silvela's 
letter. Britain had been left out in the cold, and the 
British Government, having got wind of what was in the 
air, did not conceal its displeasure.^ 

The attitude of Britain determined the Sagasta Cabinet 
to resign at the last moment rather than make itself 
responsible before the country for the consequences, and 
Sefior Silvela took the same line. *' For the remainder of 
my days I should have been unable to sleep " — exclaimed 
Sefior Maura in the Cortes^ — *' if I had belonged to a 
Government which had affixed its signature to the Treaty." 
'* It was Providence which intervened at that moment to 



1 1904. 

2 Englishmen who consider unreasonable Germany's displeasure at 
■having been treated in the same cavalier fashion by M. Delcass^ in 
1904, may do well to bear this in mind. Our annoyance in 1902 was 
^s justifiable as that of Germany two years later. 

3 June g, 1904. 



WHY SPAIN DECLINED 51 

show its love for Spain," added the Spanish Premier, with 
unconscious humour.^ In his letter Senor Silvela says 
bluntly — for a Spaniard — that for weak nations it is 
especially indispensable that " the most complete loyalty 
towards neighbours and interested parties in international 
affairs must be an inflexible rule of diplomacy." He was 
not satisfied on that score : — 

*' France offered us her diplomatic support, but this was 
not sufficient to comfort me under the circumstances." 

He had, therefore, determined to suspend his signature 
to the Treaty until he had taken steps to remove all doubts 
as to the views of " friendly Powers " by sounding them. 
Having done so he preferred that Spain should, if 
necessary, content herself with lesser gains rather than run 
the risk of " adventures." 

Thus was frustrated M. Delcass^'s first attempt secretly 
to secure a French protectorate over the greater part of 
Morocco. 

1 Senor Maura was a member of the Silvela Cabinet. 



CHAPTER XL 

THE ANGLO-FRENCH DECLARATION OF APRIL, I9O4, AND 
ITS SECRET ARTICLES. 

On April 8, 1904, the numerous outstanding causes of 
friction which had arisen between France and Britain in 
various parts of the world were simultaneously settled by 
a series of separate arrangements. A Convention regu- 
lated the Newfoundland fisheries^ and the West African 
boundaries problem^; a Declaration put an end to the 
Siamese, Madagascar and New Hebrides disputes,-* the 
former of which, under Lord Rosebery's administration, 
had brought us to the eve of war. Finally, and most 
important, a Declaration concerning Egypt and Morocco 
had rid us of irritating pin-pricks in Egypt at the price of 
surrendering our traditional policy in Morocco. To the 
latter arrangement were attached secret articles which only 
saw the light last November (1911).* 

Public opinion rightly regarded these collective under- 
standings with a favourable eye. But the last of them 
found a strong critic, in Lord Rosebery, who scandalised 
a great many people by denouncing it as the most '* one- 
sided agreement ever concluded between two Powers at 
peace with each other," and adding thereto an expression 
■of hope " that the Power which holds Gibraltar may never 
liave cause to regret having handed Morocco over to a 
great military Power. "^ 

The agreement regarding Egypt and Morocco differed 
from the others inasmuch as it affected, while the others 
did not, the interests of third parties. The British 
Government, as the party more particularly interested in 
the Egyptian section of it, formally notified the Powers — 
notably Germany. A similar courtesy was incumbent upon 

1 British White Book Cd. 2383, 

2 British White Book Cd. 2383, completing the Convention of 
June 14, 1898 — C. 9334. 

3 British White Book Cd. 2385. 

* British White Book Cd. 5969. Vide also Introduction. 
5 Queen's Hall, June 10, 1904. 

52 



CONFLICTING INTERPRETATIONS 53 

the French Government as concerned the Morocco section 
of the agreement. But, for reasons which appear to have 
been purely personal, M. Delcass^ failed formally either 
to notify Germany or Spain, the two other particularly 
interested Powers.^ In the case of Spain this breach of 
diplomatic courtesy, which was the subject of criticism in 
the course of the debate in the Spanish Cortes in the 
ensuing June, was subsequently rectified in the manner 
which will be explained hereafter. In the case of Germany 
it was never rectified, and from this incident, coupled with 
the nature of the agreement itself, and aggravated by 
further proceedings which will be described in due course, 
dates the Franco-German dispute, which in its later phases 
has brought France, Germany, and Britain, and with them 
all Europe, to the very brink of war. 

The crucial Article (2) of the arrangement, made public 
at the time, concerning the future of Morocco was this — 

** The Government of the French Republic declare that 
they have no intention of altering the political status of 
Morocco. 

** His Britannic Majesty's Government, for their part, 
recognise that it appertains to France more particularly 
as a Power whose dominions are conterminous for a great 
distance with those of Morocco, to preserve order in that 
country, and to provide assistance for the purpose of all 
administrative, economic, financial, and military reforms 
which it may require. 

"They declare that they will not obstruct the action 
taken by France for this purpose, provided that such 
action shall leave intact the rights which Great Britain, in 
virtue of treaties, conventions, and usage, enjoys in 
Morocco, including the right of coasting trade between 
the ports of Morocco, enjoyed by British vessels since 
1901.^' 

As in the case of many agreements arrived at between 
■diplomatists, it is possible to argue various shades of 

1 Vide Chapters IV. and V. '* The declaration of April 8, 1904, 
between the United Kingdom and France was not officially com- 
municated to the German Government, and there was no communica- 
tion between H.M. Government in regard to it, so far as it had 
reference to Morocco." (Lord Percy, in the House of Commons. 
April 6, 1905.) 



54 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

significance from the above stipulations. Paragraphi One 
appears to constitute a categorical pledge on the part ol 
France to maintain the independence and integrity of 
Morocco. Paragraph Two appears to convey no more than 
the recognition on the part of the British Government of 
an obvious truth, and is in no sense incompatible with the 
public declaration of the French Government in 1901^ or 
with the tenor of the Franco-Moorish '* Protocol " of that 
year and the Franco-Moorish agreement of 1902.^ From 
this point of view Article 2, while undoubtedly conveying 
a declaration of British political disinterestedness in 
Morocco, and thereby indicating a notable change in 
British policy, cannot be interpreted as implying British 
assent to a French Protectorate over that country, which 
could not come about without "altering the political" 
status of Morocco." On the other hand, it may equally 
be contended that the term " political status " is vague; 
that it does allow of an actual, although not a nominal, 
French Protectorate being exercised over Morocco, and 
that in recognising that it appertained more particularly 
to France to '* preserve order " in Morocco, the British 
Government clearly bound Great Britain to recognise a 
French Protectorate. 

That the latter interpretation is the one which accurately 
represented the views of the diplomatists concerned is- 
evident from the secret articles and from subsequent 
events. But in 1904, and in the years that followed, the 
wording of Article 2 of the published part of the agreement 
was sufficiently anomalous to complicate our share in these 
transactions in the event of any international trouble 
arising out of them— which, in fact, was what happened. 
That anomaly was emphasised by the public Franco- 
Spanish Declaration of October 3, 1904, which is dealt 
with further on, and which contains an explicit mutual 
adherence to the ** integrity of the Moorish Empire." But 
since November last the world has become aware that the 
Franco-Spanish Declaration was merely a blind — so far as 
the independence and integrity of Morocco were affected — 
to a secret Convention postulating partition. Taken 
together both public Declarations uphold the independence 
of Morocco; taken together the secret arrangements- 

IVtde Chapter HL 
^Vide Chapter IX. 



BRITISH INTERESTS SACRIFICED 5.^ 

tacked on to them provide for the destruction of that 
independence. Therein has lain the root of the entire 
mischief. It was a dishonest policy ; it was dishonest 
diplomacy ; and it has brought its own inevitable Nemesis. 
It has cost the British and French taxpayers millions of 
money in increased armaments. 

By Article 4 the British and French Governments 
declared themselves, both as regards Egypt and Morocco, 
*' equally attached to the principle of commercial liberty '* ; 
that they would not ' ' countenance any inequality either in 
the imposition of customs duties or other taxes, or of rail- 
way charges"; that the trade of both nations should 
*' enjoy the same treatment in transit through the French 
and British possessions in Africa," and that '* concessions 
for roads, railways, ports, etc., should only be granted on 
such conditions as would maintain intact the authority of 
the State over these great undertakings of public interest." 
These provisions were to hold good for thirty years only 

How entirely inadequate was this Article to protect 
and safeguard the commercial interests of Britain, and 
those of other Powers concerned in the trade and general 
economic development of Morocco, may be seen at a glance. 
The prohibition of differential tariffs upon trade in favour 
of the Power politically predominant in Morocco did not 
extend beyond thirty years — a very small fraction of time 
in the life of a nation. At the end of thirty years it was 
open to France to put into full vigour those processes which 
have so greatly hampered British trade, and trade other 
than French, in Algeria and Tunis, and virtually strangled 
it in Madagascar and French Congo. Not the slightest 
provision was made in the Article to ensure for international' 
enterprise a participation, on equal terms of contract and 
tender, either in the construction of public works in 
Morocco or in the future mineral development of the 
country whose mineral wealth was known to be potentially 
immense. So far as Britain and other Powers were con- 
cerned, Morocco was in future and in an economic sense 
handed over to French industry by the British Govern- 
ment to the detriment of British and foreign— other than 
French — industry and enterprise. 

Article 9 provided that the two Governments should 
'* afford to one another their diplomatic support in order 
to obtain the execution of the clauses of the present 
Declaration." 



56 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Their '* diplomatic support." Let the words be 
•retained.^ 

But while content to abandon its tiaditional policy of 
-an independent Morocco and to leave British commercial 
•interests in that country to the tender mercies of French 
entrepreneurs and French fiscalitis, in exchange for the 
^immense advantage of relief from perennial difficulties in 
Egypt, the British Government was not prepared to com- 
promise the safety of the Straits altogether. Article 7 
stipulated that neither Government should *' permit the 
-erection of any fortifications or strategic works on that 
portion of the coast of Morocco comprised between, but 
not including, Melilla and the heights which command the 
right bank of the River Sebou."^ Article 8 stipulated that 
France should come to an understanding with Spain, 
bearing in mind the latter's interests derived from her 
V* geographical position and her territorial possessions on 
"the Moorish coast of the Mediterranean." 

Now for the secret Articles.^ Article i foresees the 
possibility of either Government *' finding themselves con- 
strained by force of circumstances to modify this policy in 
respect to Egypt or Morocco." In that event the pro- 
visions of the public Declaration are to hold good. 
Article 3 is of capital importance, prefiguring as it does a 
French Protectorate and imposing upon that French 
Protectorate a permanent Spanish mortgage on the 
Mediterranean and North Atlantic coasts of Morocco. It 
reads as follows : — 

** The two Governments agree that a certain extent of 
Moorish territory adjacent to Melilla, Ceuta, and other 
presides should, whenever the Sultan ceases to exercise 
authority over it, come within the sphere of influence of 
Spain, and that the administration of the coast from Melilla 
-as far as, but not including, the heights on the right bank 
of the Sebou shall be entrusted to Spain. 

** Nevertheless, Spain would previously have to give 
her formal assent to the provisions of Articles 4 and 7* of 

1 " An agreement to afford diplomatic support does not impose on 
<any Power an obligation either to give or to withhold military or naval 
support." (Mr. Acland, replying for the Foreign Office to a question 
-in the House on November 27, 191 1.) 

2 See Map. 

3 First published, in part, by Le Temps, November, 191 1. 

4 The economic stipulations and the non-erection of fortifications 
tbetween Melilla and the Sebou River. 



[HE SECRET ARTICLES 57 

the Declaration of to-day's date, and undertake to carry 
them out. 

* * She would also liave to undertake not to alienate the 
whole, or a part, of the territories placed under her 
-authority or in her sphere of influence." 

Having- thus disposed of France's ** most redoubtable 
adversary in Morocco,"^ M. Delcass6 turned once more to 
Spain. 

1 Vide 'Closing paragraph of Chapter IX. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE FRANCO-SPANISH DECLARATION OF OCTOBER, I904, ANI> 
THE SECRET CONVENTION ATTACHED THERETO. 

If the character of the Ang-lo-French Declaration of 
April, 1904, i.e., the understanding come to between 
Britain and France, as the world was permitted to know 
it, was modified by the secret Articles of which the world 
was not apprised ; the public Franco-Spanish Declaration 
of the ensuing October 3 was a mere blind for the secret 
Convention signed at the same time. The Declaration 
consists of two sentences. Its purport, the solitary 
assertion that both Powers — 

" remain firmly attached to the integrity of the Moorish 
Empire under the sovereignty of the Sultan," 

and on the part of Spain a declaration of adherence to the 
Anglo-French Declaration of April 8. 

In the secret Convention,^ France and Spain calmly 
arrange for the partition of Morocco. They do so, of 
course, with British concurrence, in accordance with 
Article 8 and secret Article 3 of the Anglo-French under- 
standing, ^ and the secret Convention is communicated by 
M. Delcasse to the British Government, which acknow-^ 
ledges receipt of it on October 6.^ It may be well to insert 
these communications. 

Letter from the French Ambassador to the Marquess 
OF Lansdowne communicating the Texts of the 
Franco-Spanish Public Declaration and Secret 
Convention respecting Morocco. 

M. Camhon to the Marquess of Lansdowne. 
Dear Lord Lansdowne, 

I am instructed to communicate to you the 
arrangements which have just been concluded between 
France and Spain on the subject of Morocco. They were 

1 First published in Le Matin in November, 1911. 

2 Vide Chapter XI. 

3 British White Book, 6010. 

58 



THE SECRET CONVENTION 59 

signed on the 3rd inst. by our Minister for Foreign Affairs 
and the Spanish Ambassador at Paris; they consist of a 
general Declaration, which will be made public, and of a 
Convention, which is to be kept secret. 

M. Delcass^, in instructing me to forward to you the 
text of this agreement, in accordance with Article 8 of 
our Declaration of the 8th April, 1904, pointed out the 
confidential character of this communication, and instructed 
me to request you to be good enough to keep the Conven- 
tion entirely secret. 

I have, etc., 

Paul Cambon. 

i^ETTER FROM THE MaRQUESS OF LaNSDOWNE TO THE 

French Ambassador acknowledging the Receipt of 
THE Texts of the Franco-Spanish Public Declara- 
tion AND Secret Convention respecting Morocco. 

The Marquess of Lansdowne to M. Camhon. 

Dear M. Cambon, 

I have had the pleasure of receiving your 
letter of to-day's date, covering the two documents which 
you had been instructed to communicate to me in accor- 
dance with Article 8 of the " Declaration respecting 
Egypt and Morocco " of the 8th April last. 

I need not say that the confidential character of the 
"*' Convention " entered into by the President of the French 
Republic and the King of Spain in regard to French and 
Spanish interests in Morocco is fully recognised by us, 
and will be duly respected. The shorter paper, or 
*' Declaration " made by the two Governments is, I 
understand, public property. 

With best thanks, I am, etc., 

Lansdowne. 

The chief provisions of the secret Convention are these — 

Article 2 establishes the — 
*' sphere of influence which falls to Spain by virtue of her 
possessions on the Moorish coast of the Mediterranean,"^ 
and where she shall possess the same " right of action " 
as France has acquired by the Anglo-French under- 
standing in the remainder of the country, i.e., "to preserve 
order in " and to ** provide assistance for ... all adminis- 
trative, economic, financial, and military reforms which it 

I See Map. 



6o TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

may require!."^ Spain, however, undertakes not to- 
exercise her * ' right of action * '' for fifteen years without the- 
consent of France, unless, and here Article 3 leaves the way 
clear for a cynical breach of the public Declaration, when- 
ever it may suit the French purfK>se. 

** In case " — says Article 3 — " the continuance of the 
political status of Morocco and of the Shereefian Govern- 
ment should become impossible, or if, owing to the weak- 
ness of that Government and to its continued inability to* 
uphold law and order,^ or to any other cause,^ the 
existence of which is acknowledged by both parties, the 
status quo can no longer be maintained, Spain may freely 
exercise her right of action in the territory defined in the- 
preceding article, which henceforward constitutes her 
sphere of influence." 

Article 4 defines the Spanish sphere in Atlantic 
Morocco.* Article 8 provides that if in the course of 
exercising this above-stated " right of action " one or 
other Government is — 

*' obliged to take military action, the other contracting 
party shall at once be informed. In no case shall the 
assistance of a foreign Power be invoked." 

Article 10 provides that all schemes for public works, 
railways, etc., mineral development and " economic under- 
takings in general " in the French and Spanish spheres 
respectively, i.e., in the whole of Morocco, '* shall be 
executed " by French and Spanish enterprise. 

Thus British enterprise, and all international enterprise 
other than French and Spanish (Spanish ** enterprise '*" 
being what it is — read French), was doubly mortgaged in 
favour of the French, first by the Anglo-French under-^ 
standing, secondly by this Convention. 

The further secret Franco-Spanish Accord (September 
I, 1905), although antecedent to the Act of Algeciras, and 
in one sense belonging to that period of our inquiry, may 
more fittingly be touched upon at a later stage. 

We may now summarise the preceding chapters, which 
will focus more readily to our intelligence the antecedents 
to the Act of Algeciras. 

1 Article 4, vide Chapter XI. 

2 Which the French Government, the Algerian Administration and 
French finance had combined to bring about. Vide Chapter III. 

3 These words are really worthy of being italiGised. 
*See Map. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

SUMMARY OF THE EVENTS OF igOO-1904 AND REFLECTIONS- 
THEREON. 

A REVIEW of the events of 1900- 1904 must be a review 
covering three distinct factors, viz., the public and secret 
diplomatic commitments which three out of the four Powers 
specially interested in Morocco had undertaken towards one 
another ; the position in which the fourth was left through: 
those commitments, and the obligations entered upon by 
those three Powers towards the independent State of 
Morocco and its ruler. 

The latter point may be taken first.^ 

France had in 1901 and 1902 publicly assured Morocco 
upon repeated occasions that she had not the least inten- 
tion of threatening the independence or the integrity of that 
State. France had formally and publicly declared in an 
agreement with Great Britain that she had no intention 
of altering the political status of Morocco. France and" 
Spain had formally and publicly declared their firm attach- 
ment to the independence and integrity of Morocco. 
France and Spain, and, by implication, Great Britain, 
were, therefore, publicly pledged towards Morocco and 
towards the world at large t6 maintain the independence 
and integrity of Morocco. 

Meanwhile, in point of fact, France, Spain, and Britain 
had privately entered into contracts with one another 
whereby the destruction of the independence and integrity 
of Morocco was decreed, the date of the event to depend 
upon circumstances. 

I understand that in the current jargon of diplomacy 
that sort of thing is called " high politics." The plain man 
may be permitted to dub it by one word only — dishonesty ; 

lAt the close of 1904 no international agreement, collectively 
signed by all the Powers, explicitly proclaiming the independence and 
integrity of Morocco, existed. But the Madrid Convention of 1880 • 
(British White Book Cd. 3503) implicitly recognised that independence 
since the Powers had on that occasion negotiated with the Sultan en 
a basis of equality. Moreover, the independence of Morocco had never^ 
been questioned any more than the independence of Persia, or Russia, 
or the United States. Morocco was independent. 



62 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

and to contend that dishonesty In diplomacy, even as dis- 
honesty in business or in ordinary social life, does not 
ultimately pay. It certainly has not paid the British people 
in this particular case. On the contrary, it has involved 
them in enormous expenditure. If only the citizen of 
education and intelligence would shake himself free from 
the superstitions with which custom has invested the 
functions of the diplomatist ; if only he could be brought to 
understand that the mental powers of those engaged in 
diplomacy are really no greater than his own, and that he 
is quite as well able to arrive at sound conclusions, if the 
facts are placed before him, as these highly but narrowly 
trained persons to whom he blindly confides the negotiation 
of his affairs with foreign Powers, the peace of the world 
would rest upon a surer foundation than it does to-day. 
Because if he did awake to the truth of those simple facts 
the citizen of education and intelligence would treat the 
diplomatists he employs ju^t as he does other public 
functionaries, not as supermen, but as servants of the State, 
of which he and they are members. He would not for one 
moment tolerate that they should, unknown to him and his 
fellow-citizens, commit the nation to which he belongs to 
secret arrangements with foreign Powers calculated, under 
given circumstances, to involve him and his fellow-citizens 
in war, and lower the national standard of civic morals. 
He would not sanction one standard of honesty for the 
magistrate, the civil servant, the naval and military officer, 
and a totally different one for the diplomatist. The secret 
diplomacy of 1904 in connection with Morocco makes a 
revolting picture. That it was in the interests of the 
nations concerned, common sense and a robust belief in 
honesty alike reject. 

I resume the narrative with apologies for the 
digression. 

A sentence of doom had, therefore, been secretly pro- 
nounced against Morocco. France was to play the rSle of 
executioner, Spain that of interested assistant, and Britain 
that of interested witness, 

What had each Power obtained as the result of the 
deal? 

France had removed British opposition to a French 
absorption of four-fifths of Morocco at the price of a 
Spanish mortgage over Mediterranean and North Atlantic 
Morocco. 



'• HONESTY " 63 

Spain had secured a mortgage over Mediterranean and 
North Atlantic Morocco. 

Britain had acquired two things, at the price of sur- 
rendering her traditional policy of an independent Morocco, 
viz., relief from an irritating incubus in Egypt, and the 
exclusion of France from Mediterranean and North Atlantic 
Morocco. 

But in thus disposing, contrary to their public pledges, 
in the real or fancied interests of the peoples they repre- 
sented, of the future of an independent African State 
219,000 square miles in extent, containing eight million 
inhabitants, and of great natural wealth, the British, 
French, and Spanish diplomatists had acted without any 
international sanction, and had, moreover, deliberately 
deceived the world. 

The only feature in the deal of which the world at large, 
outside the three contracting Powers, had public 'cognis- 
ance so far as Morocco was concerned, was that Britain 
had declared her political disinterestedness in that country, 
and had recognised a special French interest within it — on 
certain conditions. 

Even the British, French and Spanish peoples 
immediately concerned were allowed to know no more than 
that! The Spanish form of government permits of 
democracy playing but a microscopic part in the affairs of 
the country. But Britons and Frenchmen, who boast of 
their democratic constitution, may well feel resentment as 
they look into this history, at having been treated like babes 
and sucklings by the men they indirectly, at least, nominate 
for office, and whose salaries they directly pay. For what 
was the upshot, to the British and French people, of the 
secret manoeuvres of their diplomatists in the assumed 
interest of those people? 

To Frenchmen it meant inter alia this. Inveiglement 
blindfolded into a policy of precipitate absorption and 
conquest in Morocco as opposed to the advertised policy 
of " peaceful penetration " which had secured for their 
ephemeral and constantly shifting rulers the support of 
virtually all classes in the nation, and which consistently, 
honourably and peacefully pursued might well have led to a 
slow evolution and assimilation more in conformity with 
the nation's real interests. Blindfolded because they were 
unaware that their Foreign Minister had heavily mortgaged 
their potential interests to a third Power — Spain. Blind- 
folded because — supremely important among all things — 
[5] 



64 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

they were being led, without knowing it, into collision with* 
Germany. 

To Britons it meant inter alia this. Inveiglement 
within the orbit of the continental system of alliances ; com- 
mitment to a revival of the era of British participation in 
the pursuit of that elusive phantom known as the balance of 
power, and aggravation of Anglo-German relations. For 
let it be well understood. It was not the general settle-^ 
ment of 1904 with France of our outstanding disputes with 
her which was the cause of these happenings. That was an 
excellent and desirable thing in itself and it received 
national sanction. It was the unsanctioned secret commit-^ 
ments to France and Spain which worked the misc1}ief. 
It was those unsanctioned secret commitments which 
marked the abandonment of Lord Salisbury's policy 
of the Concert, for the policy of entangling so-called! 
" ententes.*' 

This secret diplomacy has already involved the British 
and French peoples in an increased expenditure on arma- 
ments amounting to millions sterling. Its future con- 
sequences may be even more disastrous, especially for the 
French people, perhaps. And when I speak of the British^ 
and French peoples, I do not refer to the governing classes, 
nor to the financiers, nor to the manufacturers of war 
material : I refer to the equally deserving and hard-work- 
ing middle classes and labouring classes who pay and who^ 
suifer, for a state of things which, through lack of proper 
leadership, they continue to tolerate. 

From what precedes it must be perfectly clear that 
despite what I have termed the " Crucial Article " of the 
Act of Algeciras,^ i.e., the Article which provided that in the 
event of the provisions of any antecedent treaties, conven- 
tions, or arrangements conflicting with the Act, the Act 
should prevail ; the secret commitments of Britain, France, 
and Spain (Spain, of course, has only been the British 
Government's cat's-paw in the matter) were of such a 
character as to make the loyal fulfilment of that Article by 
those Powers in the highest degree unlikely. 

The Public Law of Europe affecting the status of 
Morocco, embodied in the Algeciras Act, publicly pro- 
claimed the independence and integrity of Morocco. 

Britain and France were signatories to that Act. 
Secretly France, with British concurrence,, had previously 

1 Vide Chapter VI. 



A VICIOUS CIRCLE 65 

arranged for the partition of Morocco between herself and 

Spain. 

Technically, in law, from the standpoint of international 
morality, the Act of Algeciras superseded this secret 
" arrangement, and any assault by one or more Powers upon 
the independence or integrity of Morocco would be an 
offence against any other Power or Powers who chose to 
regard it as such. 

A strong British Foreign Minister would have found in 
the Algeciras Act, signed by his instructions, not only the 
duty but the obligation of so directing his policy and so 
influencing the policy of France and Spain as to prevent 
complications with any other Power interested in Morocco 
from arising out of a conflict between the antecedent secret 
commitments^ of Britain towards France and Spain, and 
the stipulations of the Act adhered to by Britain. No 
strong British Foreign Minister would have allowed his 
country to be placed in the invidious position of adhering 
to an international Act proclaiming the independence and 
integrity of Morocco, and laying down specifically that the 
provisions of the Act must prevail over the provisions of 
any arrangements previously arrived at between various 
Powers, unless he had, seen his way clear to reconcile 
mutually destructive pledges. 

Sir Edward Grey proved himself incapable of breaking 
through the vicious circle in which British and French 
policy was involved by the secret evolutions of their respec- 
tive diplomats. 

And, as subsequent events were to show, two out of the 
four Powers specially interested in Morocco, with a third 
following in their wake, assisted in elaborating the Public 
Law of Europe embodied in the Algeciras Act, with the 
firm intention on the part of one of them to flout that 
Public Law and on the part of the others to condone and 
support its violation even to the point of risking a great 
war. Ere the signatures were affixed to the document, the 
capital provisions of the Act of Algeciras were doomed to 
sterility, and the process of tearing them up was begun 
soon after their formal ratification by the Powers, i.e., early 
in 1907.2 

1 It should be constantly borne in mind that the secret Articles of 
the Anglo-French Declaration, and the secret Franco-Spanish Con- 
vention only became publicly known in November, 191 1, through the 
*' indiscretion " of a couple of French newspapers. 

2 Vide Chapter VIII. 



PART V. 
Germany's Acceptance of French Assurances. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM. 

To judge impartially, nay, even to examine with intelli- 
gence, the attitude of Germany in the Morocco question 
from the date of the Anglo-French (public) Declaration to 
the despatch of the Panther to Agadir, it is necessary, I 
submit, that we should divest ourselves of such prejudices 
as we may individually entertain and honestly study the 
proceedings of that Power in the light of facts. 

Britishers lay claim to the possession of a sense of fair 
play, and, in the main, justifiably. The above suggestion 
is, therefore, peculiarly adjustable to the national character, 
even if the national interest were not closely concerned in 
its adoption. 

At this stage of our inquiry we are only called upon to 
deal with the first German intervention which led to the 
Morocco problem being brought before the Areopagus of 
the Powers, and which culminated in the elaboration of the 
Public Law we have analysed and explained. 

If the facts, covering that first period of German action, 
as here stated are inaccurately or incompletely stated, 
public opinion will rightly reject the arguments drawn from 
them by the author of this volume. If, on the other hand, 
they reriiain unchallenged, it may be that British public 
opinion will be disposed to modify, if not to reverse, the 
adverse judgment it has formed. In that event the British 
people, being essentially a great people, will not hesitate 
to admit that they have been induced, through lack of 
information and thfough misrepresentation, to form an 
\injust estimate of German conduct. They will do so 
spontaneously, impelled by their sense of fair-play. It is 
only the small-minded man who declines to allow that he 
can ever be liable to error. The same holds good in the 
case of nations, at least in a democratic State where the 
nation has means of expressing itself. But hard upon the 
heels of that spontaneous acknowledgment will come the 
consciousness that British relations with Germany have 
suffered acutely through this misunderstanding, and the 
British people will set to work^ resolutely to heal the sore, 

69 



70 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

hew out the path to an understanding, and compel their 
diplomatists to follow it. 

I assume that a perusal of Chapter V. of this volume 
has already convinced the reader that Germany was entitled 
to a voice in the future of Morocco, and I shall not, there-^ 
fore, labour the point further. 

The attitude of the German Government upon becoming- 
informed of the Anglo-French (public) Declaration appears 
to have been one of friendly expectation. Before the 
Declaration was signed, but when it was known that 
negotiations were proceeding between London and Paris, 
the North German Gazette, the recognised official organ of 
the German Government, stated (March 25, 1904) that in. 
view of the ** reiterated assurance " that France had in 
view "neither the conquest nor the occupation" of 
Morocco, German interests were, ** so far as can be 
gathered at the moment," in no jeopardy. How emphatic 
have been these assurances we have seen.^ But those 
already quoted were given to the Moorish Government and,, 
incidentally, to the world. Were there others? Yes. 
Similar statements had been made by M. Delcasse himself 
in the Senate and Chamber.^ Moreover the German 
ambassador in Paris, Prince Radolin, had asked M.. 
Delcass^ on March 27 whether it were true that he was 
negotiating a general understanding with England, and 
M» Delcass^ had replied in the affirmative. After a 
reference to Newfoundland, Prince Radolin had inquired if 
Morocco had been mentioned, and M. Delcass^ again 
answered in the affirmative, adding — 

**But you already know our point of view on the 
subject. We wish to uphold in Morocco the existing 
political and territorial status; but that status, if it is to 
last, must obviously be sustained and improved."^ 

1 Vide Chapters III. and VIIL 

2 French Yellow Book. 

3 It is perhaps interesting to point out how closely this statement ^~ 
approximates to Lord Salisbury's instructions to Sir C. Euan-Smith in 
1892 (vide Chapter II.) : ** It has been the constant aim of her 
Majesty's Government ... to preserve the independence and territoriaF 
integrity of the Empire of Morocco, while neglecting no favourable 
opportunity of impressing upon the Sultan and his Ministers the 
importance and advantage of improving the government and adminis- 
tration of the country." The difference between the two statements 
consisted in the intentions behind them. Lord Salisbury meant uhat 

he said and had acted up to it. M. Delcass^ did not mean what he 
said, and had already taken steps in a directly contrary sense. 



GERMAN INQUIRIES 71 

On April 12 the German Chancellor, Count Biilow^ 
questioned in the Reichstag on the subject of the just 
published Anglo-French agreement,^ replied that he had 
no reason to believe that it was directed against Germany 
in any way, but that he had no official notification of it. 
Gv^rmany had no interest in the existence of unfriendly 
relations between Britain and France ** which would be a 
danger to the peace of the world, of which we sincerely 
desire the maintenance." So far as Morocco was specially 
concerned, Prince Biilow said : — 

" We -are interested in that country, as, moreover, in 
the rest of the Mediterranean, principally from the 
economic standpoint. Our interests therein are, before all^ 
commercial interests ; also are we specially interested that 
calm and order should prevail in Morocco. We must 
protect our commercial interests in Morocco and we shall 
protect them. We have no reason to fear that they will 
be set aside or infringed by any Power." 

The German Press took, in the main, the same line. 
Thus, apparently, peace and harmony. 

1 Vide Chapter XL 



PART VI. 

Germany's First Intervention (1905). 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE GERMAN EMPEROR'S VISIT TO TANGIER AND ITS EFFECT 
UPON BRITISH PUBLIC OPINION. 

On March 31, 1905, the Hamburg, with the Emperor 
William on board, escorted by the cruiser Friederick Karl, 
cast anchor at Tangier.^ The visit had been planned early 
in the year and thus constituted a deliberate act of policy. 

The Emperor landed at Tangier and spent two hours 
there. Welcomed with much enthusiasm by the natives, 
the Emperor received the Diplomatic Corps, held a con- 
versation with the Sultan's representatives, who had come 
from Fez to meet him, then received the German residents, 
and wound up with a further conversation with the Sultan's 
representatives. The following is the authorised version 
of the gist of the Emperor's remarks to the latter — trans- 
lated from the French account : — 

* * The object of my visit to Tangier is to make it known 
that I am determined to do all that is in my power to safe- 
guard efficaciously the interests of Germany in Morocco. 
I look upon the Sultan as an absolutely independent 
sovereign, and it is with him that I desire to come to an 
understanding as to the best means to bring that result 
about. As for the reforms which the Sultan intends to 
introduce into his country I consider that he should proceed 
with much precaution, and should take into account the 
religious feelings of his subjects so that at no moment shall 
public order be troubled as a consequence of these 
reforms." 

Such was the German Emperor's famous Tangier 
speech. It was evidently a challenge intended and under- 
stood as such. 

But what was Germany, through the voice of its 
Emperor, then challenging? 

To us, who now have become acquainted with the Secret 
Articles of the Anglo-French Declaration of April, 1904, 
and with the Secret Franco-Spanish Convention of October 

1 The previous day the Hamburg had called at Gibraltar, and the 
Emperor had dined with Sir George White. 

75 



76 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

of the same year, it is evident that what was beingr 
challeng-ed in the Tangier speech was this secret Anglo- 
Franco-Spanish understanding providing for the partition^ 
of Morocco. 

But this secret understanding, concluded in 1904, was 
not published until 191 1, and its existence was unknown to- 
public opinion in 1905. 

So public opinion referred the Tangier challenge to the 
only thing it had been allowed to know of, namely, the 
published portion of the Anglo-French Declaration respect- 
ing Morocco. 

Instead of challenging, as he did, the secret partition of 
Morocco between France and Spain with Great Britain's 
connivance, the German Emperor was supposed to be- 
challenging the Anglo-French public proclamation of 
Morocco's independence and integrity, and, by an easy 
transition, he was represented as desiring to *' drive a 
wedge ' ' between England and France. 

Not only had the French and British Cabinets (in the 
case of the French Cabinet without the knowledge of some 
of the Cabinet's members^) made an arrangement to the 
exclusion and detriment of Germany, but, by keeping their 
arrangement from the public, and by issuing a public 
Declaration in contradiction with it, they had, intentionally, 
or unintentionally, caused Germany's act of protest to be 
utterly misrepresented. 

As a consequence, public opinion in England was 
naturally astonished and incensed. ^ 

All through 1905 the clarnour continued, and — no^ 
careful student of the journalistic literature of that period 
can entertain the slightest doubt upon the subject — was 
incited both in England and in France by the " diplomatic 
machine ' '^ concerned in working for and executing the 
secret arrangements of 1904. 

1 See foot-note 2, page 78. 

2 I discuss in Chapter XVIII. the various public incidents which 
combined to apprise Germany that the published Declaration did not 
represent the full or real character of the Anglo-Franco-Spanish deal. 
It would be surprising if the German Government did not acquire, in. 
addition to these public disclosures, further corroboration of the true 
facts through its Secret Service. 

3 The ''man in the street " is apt to suppose that the Foreign 
Minister of the day incarnates in his person the foreign policy of the 
country subject to Cabinet approval. That, of course, is a delusion. 
He only does so nominally. Foreign policy is the work of many— 
not of one, with very rare exceptions. There are the embassies- 



THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST GERMANY 'jr 

Editorials and despatches from special correspondents^ 
written for the most part, one may well believe, in com- 
plete good faith because for the most part in ignorance of 
facts, ridiculed the idea that Germany's interests in 
Morocco were sufficient to account for the Emperor's 
action. Morocco was merely a pretext. Germany's aim 
was to break up the Anglo-French entente by "brow- 
beating " France. Why, if so, she had not acted on the 
morrow of the publication of the agreement was very 
easily explained. Russia had not then been beaten to her 
knees. The Battle of Mukden had not been fought. The 
parlous state of Russia was Germany's opportunity, for, 
crippled by the temporary loss of her Eastern ally, France 
was ** at the mercy " of Germany, and must be made to see 
.that her safety depended upon breaking with Britain and 

abroad, and it happens that some one or other of the ambassadors 
may have different vieWs from those entertained by the Foreign 
Minister at home on a specific issue. If the latter has no very decided: 
views one way or another, or if he does not keep a tight hold 
over his mouthpieces abroad, the influences directed from a particular 
enibassy in a certain direction may have the most far-reaching, 
effects upon policy. That, to my own personal knowledge, has occurred 
within the past four years, in two questions of foreign policy. Then 
there are the permanent officials at home, some of whom have decided 
views, and consider themselves the real directors of the nation's- 
toreign policy and not only exercise that influence to the uttermost 
upon the Foreign Minister of the day, but impose it upon the public 
(and so, indirectly, exercise pressure upon their chief) through social 
circles and by the medium of the journalists de confiance with whom 
they are permanently in touch. It may even be — here again I speak in 
one such case from personal knowledge — that certain events may be 
prepared and worked for by members of the Foreign Minister 's- 
entourage entirely without the latter 's knowledge. So that to speak of 
a diplomatic machine is strictly accurate. Among the units composing, 
the machine are to be met with rivalries, private grudges, exaggerated 
notions of personal prestige and dignity, personal ambition, and all the 
concatenation of ills to which ordinary flesh is heir. Among the 
embassies abroad, promotion may depend, often does depend, upon 
keeping on good terms with a particular permanent official at home. 
In that you have the usual inconveniences from which Government 
Departments can never be free, doubly aggravated in the case of the 
Foreign Office by the close caste system therein traditionally prevailing" 
which makes of it the glorious preserve of a favoured few, and the lack 
of any real, effective control from the outside. All Foreign Offices are 
more or less tarred with the same brush. Some are worse than ours in 
certain respects (i.e. indiscretion and personal corruption, from the 
latter of which we are free), but in several cases (notably in the United 
States and in France) there is an effective outside check in the shape of 
a Parliamentary Committee which can often cut the knot of personal 
intrigue or at least expose it, and so prevent further mischief for a 
time. In our case there is no such corrective. 



78 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

allying- herself with her Teutonic neighbour as a pre- 
liminary step to that famous combined onslaught upon 
Britain which should end by dictating terms in London to 
the shattered remnant of a British Parliament driven to 
seek refuge upon Exmoor or somewhere in the Welsh hills. 

And when it became apparent that all Germany was 
aiming at was an international Conference to adjudicate 
upon the future of Morocco, and that every one of M. 
Delcass6's colleagues and the overwhelming majority of 
the French Parliament^ was in favour of treating Germany 
less cavalierly than M. Delcass^ had treated her, the 
clamour, instead of lessening, redoubled. The ** diplomatic 
machine " worked full time through its chosen organs. 
M. Delcass^ was represented as the unhappy victim of 
German resentment for the leading part he had played in 
concluding the Anglo-French general settlement, and 
France as being harried at the point of the bayonet into 
compassing his fall. As upon a more recent occasion, we 
were goaded into being more French than the French, and 
the powerful occult influences which move behind the scenes 
and mould public opinion did their utmost to counteract the 
more moderate sections of French public life. 

I commend a perusal' of the foreign pages of the Times 
of this period — say from May to November, 1905. They 
made astonishing reading. The insults and threats to 
Germany mingled with personal abuse of the Emperor 
William, in the Paris and Berlin telegrams, especially the 
Paris telegrams, are incessant. No less remarkable is the 
partisan bias in favour of M. Delcass^ against his home 
critics. Praise of M. Delcass^ is the test of statesmanship, 
and the rare expressions of it are religiously recorded ; 
criticism of his policy and the numerous expressions 
thereof, are rigidly curtailed, or explained as evidence of 
the narrowest party politics. Germany's right to a say in 
the Moroccan settlement is scornfully denied. The idea 
of a Conference is violently opposed. ** It ought not to be 
entertained for a moment. "^ It would be a ** humiliation," 

1 The French Parliament was, of course, ignorant, as a body, of the 
secret Articles of the Anglo-French Declaration and of the Franco- 
Spanish secret Convention. So, indeed, were some of the Foreign 
Minister's colleagues. The Minister of Marine, and also the Minister 
for the Colonies in the Rouvier-DelcassS Cabinet of igo4, publicly 
protested in November last, i.e. when the secret Convention with 
Spain was published, that they had been kept entirely in the dark. 

2 June 12. 



THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST GERMANY 79 

a "capitulation," the "sooner the whole matter is 
negatively disposed of the better. "^ The correspondents 
cease to be impartial or even faithful recorders of events to 
become vehement units of the machine bent upon forcing 
again and again a particular viev^^ upon the public. 
Observe these typical despatches : — 

" There is no Moroccan question. It was finally settled 
by the Anglo-French entente," (Times, April 7 : Paris 
despatch.) 

*' The idea of a conference can never have been 
seriously entertained even in Berlin. If Germany wants 
to court another failure, she has only to propose or get it 
proposed by the Sultan of Morocco." (Times, April 10 : 
Paris despatch.) 

* * Germany is evidently retiring as gracefully as she 
can . . . and as to M. Delcass6's position, it has certainly 
not been weakened." (Times, April 12 : Paris despatch.) 

* * The international Conference which it is suggested 
should be proposed by the Sultan of Morocco, and which 
Count von Tattenbach (the German Minister at Fez, the 
same official whom the Times praised in 1892 for helping 
the British mission) says will be supported by Germany, i^ 
will probably never take place. ... Its object could only 

be to revise or stultify the agreement recently concluded by 
France and to give Germany a voice in matters with which 
she has nothing to do. "^ (Times, May 2 : Paris despatch.) 

* ' Consequently it may be announced with confidence 
that the Moroccan proposal for a European Conference will 
be entertained by only one of the Great Powers — namely, 
Germany. On all sides it is recognised that Germany must 
have foreseen that an invitation coming from Morocco 
would meet with no response, and this confirms the general 
opinion as to Germany's whole Moroccan policy being a 
mere blind for something else." (Times, June 5 ; Paris 
despatch.) 

The more French opinion gravitates towards a Con- 
ference the more ' bitterly is the Conference condemned. 
When the British Foreign Office, through the mouth of 
its representative at Fez, informs the Sultan that Britain 
will not attend a Conference, a paean of triumph is set up 
in the editorial columns. I do not question for a moment 

IJune 9. 

2 Let it he repeated again and yet again, that the public to which 
ihis sort of thing was ceaselessly repeated, was in entire ignorance of 
4he secret agreements, which only saw the light in November, igii. 
[6] 



8o TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

the good faith of all this. I assume that the writers of 
these despatches and editorials were unaware of the secret 
arrangements in existence. But those that inspired them 
undoubtedly were not, and the whole affair illustrates the 
dangerous lengths to which a secret diplomacy is willing 
to go in the manipulation of public opinion in order to save 
**face," or promote specific ends even at the risk of 
precipitating a great war. The motives may be of the 
highest. But the whole system involves the nation in 
terrible dangers, and is vicious and unhealthy in the 
extreme. 

In this particular case the secret policy of France and 
Britain can fairly be described as having been Machia- 
vellian, and the object pursued by its promoters (when 
they found it openly and resentfully challenged) was to- 
inspire the public mind with the belief that it was on the 
contrary the policy of Germany that was inspired by the 
precepts of the great Italian. 

Englishmen have, apparently, failed so far to grasp 
how fundamentally the entire history of the Morocco 
affair — as interpreted to them in the course of the last 
seven years has been altered by the now revealed secret 
Anglo-French and Franco-Spanish (insisted upon by the 
British Government) compacts. We have a curious 
inability to credit that our nationally uncontrolled diplo- 
macy can be anything but honest and straightforward; 
although ready enough to believe that Continental diplo- 
macy is invariably dishonest and tortuous. The plain truth 
of the matter is that the Anglo-Franco-Spanish secret 
diplomatic arrangements of 1904 constituted a breach of 
trust towards the peoples of Britain, France, and Spain. 
The House of Commons does not appear to have realised 
the nature and effect of these commitments, since they were 
avowed at the close of last year by the British Foreign 
Office, or the painful impression caused by their revelation 
in France. The numerous allusions thereto in the French 
Chamber and Senate have been studiously withheld from 
the British public. It is well, perhaps, that one or two 
extracts from the speeches of French Senators in the 
debates of February, 191 2, should be here appended. 

Baron d'Estournelles de Constant, speaking on 
February 6, 191 2, remarked — 

"The French Parliament, by an abuse morally, if not 
constitutionally, unpardonable, was kept in ignorance of 



FRENCH PLAIN SPEAKING Si 

this policy. . . . Far from ensuring general peace, the 
arrangements of 1904 tended to compromise it. . . . Why 
was the French Parliament told only half the truth when 
it was asked to pass its opinion upon our arrangement with 
England? Why was it not allowed to suspect that this 
arrangement had as its complement and corrective some 
secret clauses and other secret Treaties? It is this, it is 
this double game towards Parliament and towards the 
world which becomes morally an abuse of trust. . . Now 
the whole effort of the arrangement of 1904 appears to-day 
in its truth and in its vanity. It was a Treaty of friendship 
with England recognising the freedom of our political 
action in Morocco and also proclaiming our will to respect 
the integrity of that country ; that was what the public 
knew and approved. But the public was ignorant that at 
the same time, by other Treaties and by contradictory 
clauses hidden from it, the partition of Morocco between 
Spain and France was prepared, of that Morocco of which 
we guaranteed the integrity. There existed two irreconcil- 
able French policies in Morocco, that of public arrange- 
ments, that is to say, a policy of integrity which was not the 
true one; and that of secret arrangements postulating a 
Protectorate and the partition of Morocco." 

M. de Lamarzelle was even more emphatic — 

** This secret Franco-Spanish Treaty interests Spain, no 
doubt, but it interests still more England, by whom and 
for whom it was made. . . . Why was this secret Treaty 
hidden? I can find no other reason than this, that perhaps 
.if Parliament had been told all the sacrifices which were 
imposed upon us by this secret Treaty, the public Treaty 
would not have been voted. " (Feb. 7.) 

M. Ribot, the ** Father of the House," speaking on the 
9th, also accentuated the cynical contradiction between 
public professions and private commitments — 

** In 1904 a Treaty was signed — a secret Treaty — whose 
clauses we have only recently learned . . . ; it was a Treaty 
of partition and has created difficulties which are not yet * 
all cleared away. Spain was bound to consider, and did/ 
consider, that it was a partition of sovereignty betweei^ 
France and Spain at the very time when a public Act 
declared that the two nations were profoundly attached to 
the independence and to the integrity of Morocco. ' ' 



82 TEN YEARS OF SECRE7 OJPl OMACV 

British and French tax-payers have paid a heavy bill. 
One wonders whether they have learned a lesson. 

No desire to crush and humiliate France; no designs 
upon the Anglo-French entente; no personal dislike to 
M. Delcass6 were needed to explain the change in the 
attitude of Germany. The facts germane to the subject 
immediately at issue were fully sufficient not only to 
explain but to justify that change. For in the interval 
between Prince Billow's first references in the Reichstag 
to the Anglo-French settlement and the German Emperor's 
visit to Tangier, Germany had gradually awakened to the 
fact that she had been flouted in a way seldom meted out 
to a great Power, and which no great Power could by any 
possibility tolerate, ever has tolerated, or ever will tolerate. 
This,. I venture to think, the next chapter will make 
abundantly clear. 



N 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE GERMAN CASE IN I905. 

The initial and gratuitous offence committed against 
Germany by the French Foreign Minister was his deliberate 
failure officially to notify the Anglo-French (public) 
Declaration of 1904 to the German Government; a policy 
repeated by him in the ensuing October in connection with 
the Franco-Spanish (public) Declaration. In the case of 
the former of these arrangements, even the courtesy call 
upon the Wilhelmstrasse of the French ambassador was 
delayed for three weeks after the publication of the 
Declaration in the Journal Officiel. Whether M. Delcass^ 
did or did not enter upon negotiations with Germany in the 
1901-1902 period — i.e., when his policy was directed at 
partitioning Morocco with Spain behind the back of Great 
Britain^ — is immaterial. Of course, if he did, his attitude 
in 1904 was the more inexcusable. 

But apart from that consideration altogether, Germany 
as a party, and an active one, to the first (and, at that 
moment, the only) International Conference which had 
been held on the affairs of Morocco, was entitled to have 
the opportunity given her, which an official notification 
alone afforded according to the unwritten law of diplomatic 
etiquette between States, to ask questions and to discuss 
the tenor of an agreement arrived at between two Powers 
concerning the territory of a State in which Germany was 
interested and in whose concerns she had already, and 
upon several occasions, intervened. In addition to this 
technical and unquestionable right, Germany's commercial 
Treaty with Morocco; her friendly participation with and 
assistance to Lord Salisbury's envoy in his endeavours to 
strengthen the ** open door " for trade in Morocco, to 
improve the Shereefian administration, and to uphold the 
independence of Morocco against French designs; her 
own Missions to the Sultan's Court; the fact that she 
maintained a legation at Fez as well as at Tangier; her 

1 Vide Chapter X. 
83 



84 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

not inconsiderable and growing- commercial interests in the 
country; her quarter of a century's active relations with 
it^ were, in themselves, more than sufficient to justify her 
claim to be advised and consulted. Those who have argued 
the contrary can only have done so in ignorance of facts 
publicly accessible. 

Can it be seriously contended that because France had 
succeeded in inducing Britain, for a consideration, to 
disinterest herself in the future of Morocco and to recog-nise 
a special French interest therein, that France was, there- 
fore, entitled to proceed as though the interests of other 
Powers were of no account? We know that she did not 
do so in regard to Spain, whose economic interests were 
much smaller than Germany's, because the British Govern- 
ment, in the interest of British policy, had not only willed 
otherwise but had imposed upon France^ a Mediterranean 
Morocco in the hands of Spain. Yet, not only had France 
concluded an arrangement with Britain closely and, indeed, 
vitally affecting the future of an independent State with 
which Germany had long historical connections and im- 
portant interests, both existing and potential, but she had 
not even given Germany the chance of having a friendly 
discussion as to its purport after its conclusion. She had 
followed this up by signing a joint Declaration with Spain, 
treating Germany in regard thereto with the same con- 
spicuous aloofness. 

It is no secret — indeed, the documents printed in the 
French Yellow Book virtually admit it — that the French 
ambassador at Berlin would have personally preferred 
that the Declaration should have been notified in the usual 
manner. When the omission and its significance became 
known in France, subsequent to the German Emperor's 
entry upon the scene, M. Delcass^'s countrymen almost 
unanimously took the same view. When at the famous 
Cabinet Council which led to his resignation, M. Delcass^ 
defended his action and vehemently opposed any modifica- 
tion in the French official attitude towards Germany, he 
was overruled by his colleagues without a single exception. 
His fall from power was not due, as a mischievous legend 
has attributed it, to German intrigue, but to the dis- 
approval of his methods entertained by Frenchmen quite as 
patriotic as himself. I defy anyone who has impartially 

1 Vide Chapter V. 

2 Unknown to the French Parliament and people. 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 85 

studied the French published Hterature on the point — Par- 
liamentary, Press, and other — to arrive at any other con- 
clusion. Moreover, to credit the leg-end is to display an 
abysmal ignorance of the French character with which the 
author of this volume may claim to be closely acquainted. 
The French are a very proud and a very sensitive^ people, 
and had they really believed, as M. Delcasse's friends and 
British journalists inspired by the British embassy in Paris, 
or by the Foreign Office, ceaselessly dinned into the ears of 
the public, viz., that their Foreign Minister was being 
liounded from power by German pressure upon the French 
Cabinet, nothing would have induced them to part with 
him.^ The fact was, of course, that M. Delcasse had 
become impossible ; for French common sense, and French 
logic too, desired to arrive at an understanding with Ger- 
many, and M. Delcasse's policy was leading direct to an 
open rupture. That is why M. Delcasse disappeared, and 
for no other reason. Indeed, M. Delcasse's obstinacy had 
made the problem so acute that even before his resignation, 
M. Rouvier, the French Premier, as the Yellow Book 
reveals, had found it necessary to enter into direct pour 
parleys on the situation with the German ambassador at 
Paris. ^ 

Prince Biilow subsequently explained German senti- 
ment on M. Delcasse's action in several quarters,* and 
notably in a despatch to the German ambassador at 
Paris, ^ from which it may be useful to make the following 
extracts : — 

1 It is a pity, for the harmonious relations of the two peoples, that 
this characteristic is not more generally recognised by the German 
Press. 

2 In an incautious Paris despatch in the Times, describing, not 
indeed, as it purported to do, the " general feeling " in France, this 
truth was incidentally admitted :*' The general feeling here is that 
whoever might succeed M. Delcass^ would be the nominee of the Ger- 
man Emperor, a fact which is alone likely to prolong M. Delcasse's 
term of office." (Times, May 16, 1905.) In point of fact M. Delcass^ 
resigned three weeks later (June 7). In passing — could anything be 
more offensive than that message — both to Germany and to France? 
It is a revelation in itself of the desperate efforts of the * 'machine " 
to keep M. Delcass6 in power. 

3 Vide Prince Bulow's despatch April 28, 1905. M. Delcass^ re- 
signed on June 7. In other words, M. Rouvier acted in 1905 as 
M. Caillaux acted in 191 1. In fcoth cases the motive was the same, to 
■come to an understanding — a peace policy instead of a war policy. 

* Inter alia to a correspondent of the Petit Parisien and to M. 
•Georges Villiers of Le Temps (October, 1905). 
5 May I, 1905. YeJlow Book. 



86 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

"A diplomatic document so far-reaching- as the 
Morocco Convention cannot be judged on the strength of 
oral and fragmentary statements : it is not necessary to 
prove this. For overtures of such importance the written 
formula is that which diplomatic usage consecrates. The 
formal and material insufficiency of the allusions and indi- 
cations communicated here last year by your Highness and 
by M. Bihourd (the French ambassador) from M. Delcass^, 
iis a fact which neither of the two parties concerned can 
remove. . . It would have been, as we have already said, 
conformable to international usage for France, upon the 
conclusion of the Anglo-French accord concerning 
Morocco, to communicate this accord in the usual manner,, 
to all the interested Powers which are sufficiently desig- 
nated as such by their signatures at the bottom of the Act 
of the Madrid Conference."^ 

" But," one can imagine a reader at this stage reflect- 
ing, ** if you have proved to my satisfaction that Germany 
had a legitimate grievance in her treatment by M. Delcass^^ 
I still do not altogether understand why she waited for the 
best part of a year before giving expression to her resent- 
ment. " The question would be reasonable, and the answer 
is not far to seek. 

M. Delcasse's attitude had two consequences. It had 
given umbrage. It had aroused suspicion : had thrown 
doubt upon the sincerity of his professions as to French 
intentions towards Morocco. The ambiguous character of 
Article 2 of the Anglo-French (public) Declaration, even 
taken by itself {i.e., without the context of the secret 
Articles together with the secret Franco-Spanish Conven- 
tion), has already been commented upon,^ opening as it did 
with a formal declaration on the part of France that she did 
not intend to alter the political status of Morocco and 
closing with a recognition op the part of Britain that it 
appertained to France ** more particularly ... to pre- 
serve order" in Morocco. Germany was on the alert, 
watchful and suspicious. If there was anything more 
behind the Declaration, then, clearly, the economic Article' 
left the field wide open to serious future injury to German 
commercial interests. 

In October, 1904, Germany was confronted with the 
further spectacle of France signing a joint Declaration w!*h 

1 Yellow Book. 2 Vide Chapter XI. 

3 Chapter XI. 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 87 

Spain, variously described as ** a Spanish endorsement of 
the Anglo-French Ag-reement of last April," and as ** an 
annex to the Anglo-French Convention." Here again- 
came from France neither formal notification, nor any 
proposal for a similar friendly agreement v^ith Germany, 
notwithstanding that her actual and potential interests in' 
Morocco were far greater than any of which Spain could 
boast. It now became patent that Germany was being 
studiously left on one side : that France, backed by Britain, 
and in conjunction with Spain, was bent upon pursuing a 
certain policy in Morocco without either consultation or 
discussion of any kind with Germany. The intention was 
so deliberate on the face of it that it could no longer be 
ignored. From this time onwards the German Government 
and German opinion passed from suspicion to angry 
certainty. To considerations of positive interest were now 
added considerations of national prestige, which Reuter's> 
note did not certainly tend to assuage : — 

** Every detail of the negotiations " — declared this 
obviously authorised pronouncement — " has been made^ 
known to the British Government, and the terms of the 
new Treaty are regarded with satisfaction by the Govern- 
ments of London, Paris, and Madrid. The Treaty contains 
a number of secret clauses which will not he made public.*' 

So the cat had been let out of the bag ! There was a secret 
Treaty as well as a public one ! France, Britain, and Spain . 
were calmly disposing of Morocco between them, and' ' 
treating Germany '* as of no account in the Cabinet of 
nations." 

Thenceforth dated the situation which for more than ] 
seven years has poisoned the whole European atmosphere; ' 
embroiled British, French, German, and Spanish relations, 
and placed an enormous and constantly growing burden 
of added expenditure upon the peoples of those countries. 
Thenceforth dated the situation which Sir Edward Grey 
instead of seeking to improve by orienting his policy after 
Algeciras in a more friendly spirit towards Germany — 
retaining what was good but rejecting what was bad in 
the policy of his predecessor — has aggravated and 
worsened to such a degree that only yesterday we escaped^ 
a general conflagration. Veritably the process of being a 
party to the stealing of another man's land brings with it 
its own Nemesis. Unfortunately it is the people in whose 



A 



88 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY" 

name, but without whose sanction, these things are done 
who have to pay. 

When did German diplomacy ascertain the substance 
•of the secret Franco-Spanish Convention, and of the secret 
Articles of the Anglo-French Declaration? No one out- 
side the charmed circle can pronounce upon that definitely.' 
But all the circumstances point to the German Government 
having become aware of the former very shortly after its 
conclusion, and after Reuter's public announcement quoted 
above that secret clauses existed. Its contents were com- 
municated to the head of the French Colonial Party, 
M. Etienne, at the time. So much is clear from the 
interview with that politician which was published in 
Le Temps of October 8, 1904. The indiscretion of French 
politicians and journalists is, moreover, notorious. The 
way in which copies of secret documents whose originals 
repose at the Quai d'Orsay are hawked about for sale to 
the highest bidder is equally notorious to any student of 
French diplomatic history. Quite recent events have 
yielded an astonishing crop of this kind of revelation, dis- 
closing depths of corruption which cast doubts upon the 
stability of French Republican institutions. (The Conven- 
tion was finally published last November by Le Matin ! The 
secret Articles of the Anglo-French Declaration last 
November by Le Temps ! ) The undisguised indignation^ 
which pierce through the German official despatclies of the 
period, subsequent to the German Emperor's visit to 
Tangier, argue the possession not only of a case sound in 
itself but of a case so fortified by unavowed proof as to be 
irresistible. That the Kaiser's visit to Tangier was the out- 
come of a thorough knowledge of the entire intrigue for the 
political dismemberment of Morocco, and the future 
monopolisation of its resources by France, cannot, I think, 
^be for one moment in question. 

Can any man who is not hopelessly prejudiced contest 
the justification of Germany's action when he reviews this 

IWas it surprising when, with the knowledge she possessed 
Germany was still treated to this sort of thing from M. Delcass^? 
The extract is from one of the French Foreign Minister's speeches in 
April, 1905 : " Morocco knew that France was not seeking a pretext to 
enlarge the scope of her programme of policy in that country. . . She 
•could secure her future in the Western basis of the Mediterranean 
.sans ftoisser aucun droit, sans leser aucun inter et," And that was 
*he statesman who had just secretly arranged with Britain and Spain 
to put Morocco in his pocket ! 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 8q 

story and recalls the character of the Franco-Spanish secret 
Convention?^ Acquiescence in the accomplished fact 
would have meant for Germany the meek acceptance on the 
one hapd of an unparalleled rebuff ; on the other the gradual 
strangulation of German economic development — the work 
-of twenty years — in one of the great potential markets of 
the world. ^ Should we, in Germany's place, have turned 
the other cheek? No Britisher will be prepared to answer 
in the affirmative. 

If any further proof had been lacking as to the character 
of French designs, and British concurrence in those 
designs, it would have been provided by events in Morocco 
itself. These events explain the concluding portion of the 
Emperor's remarks to the representatives of the Sultan at 
Tangier.^ The publication of the Anglo-French Declara- 
tion had struck the Moors, already, as we have seen, 
disappointed at the absence of any categorical assurances 
from M. Loubet,* and profoundly disquieted by the increas- 
ing anti-Moorish character of French policy on the 
Algerian-Morocco frontier region, with consternation. The 
Sultan appealed privately, and as the months went on again 
and again, to the German representative at Tangier for 
support. The French representatives at Fez strove without 
effect to calm the Moorish Government's apprehensions. 
Then came the publication of the Franco-Spanish Declara- 
tion with its avowed but unspecified secret clauses. This 
arrangement does not appear to have been even com- 
municated to the Sultan. On the top of everything 
M. Delcass^ pitched a whole series of proposed reforms 
at the head of the now thoroughly alarmed Sultan.^ It 
was the final drop in the cup : the last link connecting up 
the interests of Germany and the interests of the Moorish 
'Government in a common resistance to a policy planned in 

1 Vide Chapter XII . 

2 The way in which France treats foreign trade in her overseas 
possessions is of public notoriety, and has been a matt^ of serious loss 
to British interests, whenever the flag of France flies outside of Europe. 

On the other hand, there is no difl'erential treatment of trade in the 
German oversea dependencies. 

3 Vide Chapter XIV. 

4 Vide Chapter IX. 

5 An anti-German, but also an anti-Delcass^ French authority — 
M. B6rard — makes the following comment : " At one blow everything 
must be carried out : army, justice, administration, routes, frontiers, 
State-bank, custom-houses, education, sanitary measures, police. Then 
■everything fell to pieces (Alors tout craque)." 



go TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

secret and openly provocative both to Morocco and ta- 
Germany. 

Even in France some far-seeing men had become 
disturbed. Speaking in the Chamber on November 3^ 
M. Deschanel, the Chairman of the Parliamentary Foreign-- 
Affairs Committee, remarked : — 

" Everything has been sacrificed to Morocco, but there 
was one great danger, viz., that the policy of France in 
Morocco would so tie her hands as to embarrass her policy 
in Europe." 

And so the Kaiser went to Tangier and Baron von- 
Tattenbach a little later to Fez,^ where he was received 
as a liberator and Morocco's only friend, as the Kaiser had 
been received at Tangier. And so, after a prolonged and 
desperate struggle by M. Delcass6, by the British Foreign 
Office, by the British Embassy in Paris, and by the Times, 
the Sultan's suggestion for a Conference, advised by the 
Germans, was accepted, first by Italy, then by Austria, 
then by the other Powers in succession, and, finally, by 
France and Britain. And so was framed that Public Law 
of Europe embodied in the Act of Algeciras concerning 
Morocco's future, "based upon the independence of the 
Sultan, and the integrity of his dominions," and providing 
that if any precedent arrangement between the Powers 
and Morocco conflicted with the stipulations of the Act, 
the stipulations of the Act should prevail. Germany had 
acted in accordance with her rights, her dignity, and her 
interests. She was not the provoking party, but the pro- 
voked. She had been treated with contumely and con- 
tempt. She had been humbugged and flouted. For twelve 
months she and her Emperor had been abused and insulted 
almost daily in the columns of powerful British newspapers, 
believed to be inspired by the British diplomatic machine ; 
accused of every imaginable perfidy and conspiration 
against the p^ace of the world. But she had consistently 
stuck to her guns, had declined to be led into retaliatory 
measures by the clamour of her own jingoes, and basing 
herself solely upon the incontestable legitimacy of her 
position as a signatory to the Madrid Convention, as 

ITo Reuter's agent at Tangier, who interviewed him before he 
left, Baron von Tattenbach said : ** Germany's course is clear. She 
claims equal rights with other nations, and insists upon the integrity 
of the Moorish Empire." 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 91 

possessor of a commercial Treaty with Morocco, as the 
upholder of an independent Morocco, and as the holder of a 
considerable economic interest in that country, she had 
gained her aim, not because of her strength placed at the 
service of an unjust case, but because of the essential and 
intrinsic justice of her case. And her aim was an Inter- 
national Conference. 

In numerous documents other than those already 
■quoted, the German Government has explained and defined 
its fundamental position. I select the following : — 

(Extract from Prince Billow's despatch to the German 
Embassies abroad) : — 

** April 12, 1905. — The German Government took no 
-action (i.e., upon the publication of the Anglo-French 
'(public) Declaration of April 8, 1904), seeing that the 
Anglo-French arrangement postulates the status quo and 
that, consequently, we thought ourselves entitled to 
■suppose that the Powers interested in the Morocco Con- 
vention {i.e., the Madrid Convention) would be consulted 
by France in case France had in view in Morocco innova- 
tions tending to circumscribe the rights and liberties of the 
other signatory Powers of the Convention, in their extent 
or their duration. We perceived, however, that this 
opinion was erroneous, and that the time had come to think 
of the protection of German interests, when the Morocco 
Government inquired if it were true that the Minister of 
France at Fez was, as he professed, the mandatory of the 
European Powers,^ and it became known that different 
features in the French alleged programme of reforms were 
in contradiction with the maintenance of the status quo. . . 
Seeing that we must now reckon with the possibility of a 
French Protectorate over Morocco, that is to say, with the 
-complete expulsion of non-French economic enterprises, 
such as has taken place in Tunis, the interests of foreigners 
are threatened in their totality and a Conference would be 
more than ever advisable. That is an issue which should 
not infringe the legitimate sensibilities of anyone, seeing 
that it only means recourse to an expedient already often 
employed." 

l/.e. in Decembfr, 1904, when M. Delcass6 presented his pro- 
gramme of reforms to the Sultan through the French representative. 



(/ 



92 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

(Extract from Prince Billow's despatch to the German^ 
Ambassador at London) : — 

** April 15, 1905. — We are acting- in regard to our 
interests, of which there is apparently the desire to dispose 
without our assent. The importance of these interests is 
in this connection (ici) a secondary matter. Any man from 
whose pocket it is proposed to take money will defend him- 
self to the extent of his capacities, whether five marks or 
five thousand marks are concerned. We possess economic 
interests in Morocco. That does not require proof. If, by 
our silence, we renounce them, we shall thus encourage the- 
world, which is watching us, to adopt a similar lack of con- 
sideration to our detriment in other questions, perhaps- 
more important." 

(Extract from Prince Billow's despatch to the German- 
Ambassador at Paris) : — 

** April 28, 1905. — Express in my name all my thanks 
to the Minister-President {i.e., the French Premier, M. 
Rouvier) for his conciliatory declaration. I think I may 
conclude therefrom that he realises the situation in which 
Germany would find herself if third parties disposed of 
German interests without consulting us. If a great Power 
were to admit this fashion of ignoring its existence, the 
said Power would be incurring inconvenience in the future,, 
not to say dangers. The material value of the threatened 
interests only comes in here as a secondary factor. I think 
I may conclude from the overtures which the Minister- 
President has made to your Highness, that the idea of a 
unilateral {i.e., one-sided) and brutal solution of the ques- 
tion of interest is as far from his spirit as it is from the 
Government of his Majesty the Emperor. The Imperial 
Government is conscious that its interests in this question 
are identical with those of a certain number of other States. 
It is to be hoped that the existing tension will cease, and 
will be settled in a satisfactory manner, thanks to the par- 
ticipation of all the interested parties. We are fully dis- 
posed to assist therein." 

(Extract from the Speech of the German Emperor upoa 
the opening of the Reichstag on November 28, 1905, i.e., 
after France had agreed to a Conference) : — 

*' The difficulties which have arisen between us and 
France on the Morocco question have had no other origin 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 93 

than an inclination to settle without our co-operation affairs- 
in which the German Empire had also interests to maintain. 
To my satisfaction an understanding has been arranged 
on the Moroccan question by diplomatic means and with 
consideration for the interests and honour of both parties 
regarding the convocation and the programme of a fresh 
Morocco Conference.'* 

The distinguished French publicist, M. de Pressens^, 
strongly pro-British in his sympathies, and for many years 
the Foreign Editor of Le Temps — when Le Temps enjoyed 
a very different reputation from what it does at present — 
has summarised in a few scathing sentences the Delcass^ 
policy towards Germany : — 

** We know by what a series of faults an excellent 
situation was compromised. M. Delcass^, inebriated by 
the entente with England, of which he had been but an 
eleventh-hour artisan, hypnotised by the favour of the 
Tsar, thought the hour had struck for heroic enterprises. 
He dreamed, if he did not conscientiously project, a sort of 
revanche by the humiliation of Germany." 

Prior to last November (191 1) — i.e.j prior to the publica- 
tion of the secret Articles of the Anglo-French Declaration 
of 1904, and the secret Franco-Spanish Convention — those 
who took the view that despite her legitimate grievance 
arising from the obvious attempt at ostracisation pursued 
by M. Delcasse, Germany's action in 1905 was needlessly 
emphatic, could have made out a reasoned argument in 
support of their contention. But with the disclosure of all 
this secret diplomacy, now public property, but as yet 
insufficiently appreciated, Germany's action at the time is 
seen to have been cumulatively justified. 

What an opportunity lay before Sir Edward Grey after 
Algeciras to repair the errors of the past, and to satisfy 
Germany, that, while remaining faithful to the spirit of 
our happy settlement of differences with France, we had 
no desire to persist in a policy of antagonism towards the 
German Government ! How egregiously he has failed to 
take it ; how, on the contrary^ he has allowed the Morocco- 
sore, for which the Algeciras Act provided the needed 
balm, to fester and putrify, the following chapters will, 
I think, give abundant proof to all who have preserved the 



94 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

faculty of weighing evidence and of passing a reasoned 
judgment upon facts. ^ 

A review of this period would, however, be incomplete 
without a brief reference to an incident which must have 
revealed only too clearly to German statesmen the peculiar 
interpretation, even then, placed in certain quarters upon 
the settlement of Anglo-French differences. Soon after his 
fall, M. Delcass6 had allowed himself to be interviewed by 
a Paris newspaper,^ in the course of which he delivered 
himself of the following opinions : — 

** Of what importance would the young navy of Ger- 
many be in the event of war in which England, I tell you, 
would assuredly be with us against Germany? What 
would become of Germany's ports, or her trade, or her 
mercantile marine? They would be annihilated. That is 
what would be the significance of the visit, prepared and 
calculated, of the British squadron to Brest, while the 
return visit of the French squadron to Portsmouth will 
complete the demonstration. The entente between the 
two countries, and the coalition of their navies, constitutes 
such a formidable machine of naval war that neither 
Germany, nor any other Power, would dare to face such 
an overwhelming force at sea. ' ' 

But worse was to follow. In October, M. Stephane 
Lauzanne, the well-known publicist, came out in the 
columns of Le Matin with what purported to be an account 
of the final and fiercely controversial meeting of the French 
Cabinet, already referred to, in the course of which 
M. Delcass^ had found himself in a minority of one, and 
had been forced to resign in consequence. The crux of the 
narrative was that M. Delcass^ had informed his colleagues 
of England's willingness, if a rupture occurred between 

1 It is worth while just noting here that there are numerous indi- 
cations about the middle and end of 1905, suggesting that Count Biilow 
and M. Rouvier were anxious, as Le Temps put it on July 4, that, 
** When the Moroccan question is settled, arrangements may be con- 
cluded on other points which will strengthen the friendly relations 
between France and Germany." It was about this time that com- 
pensation in the French Congo was first mooted — as the German 
Chancellor and M. Caillaux have both recently admitted — in the event 
of further development of French designs in Morocco. The subject 
does not appear to have been revived until early in 1909, when the long 
and obscure negotiations began under the Briand Ministry. I shall 
deal with these later on. 

2 Le Gaulois, July 12, 1905. 



THE GERMAN CASE IN 1905 95 

France and Germany, to mobilise her fleet, seize the Kiel 
Canal, and land 100,000 men in Schleswig-Holstein. A 
curiously worded denial was issued in England. M. 
Delcass^ declined to be drawn". M. Jaur^s, whose honesty 
is unquestioned, declared that he had been told exactly the 
same by a member of the Cabinet soon after the meeting. 

There was a great outcry in Germany, naturally. The 
** Faber " revelations of 191 1 are the pendant of the 
obviously inspired Lauzanne disclosures of 1905. It needs 
a certain hardihood, in view of these occurrences, to 
describe Germany as the aggressor in the Morocco affair. 



I 



[7] 



i; 



PART VII. 
Prologue to Germany's Second Intervention. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

HOW FRANCE (wiTH BRITISH CONCURRENCE) TORE UP THE ACT 
OF ALGECIRAS, AND HOW SPAIN FOLLOWED SUIT. 

Having examined the events which led up to Germany's 
first intervention, we have now to examine the events which 
provoked Germany's second intervention. 

Before doing so it is necessary to revert to the positive 
action of France and Spain and to the attitude of French 
and British diplomacy after the French and British Govern- 
ments had affixed their signatures to an International 
Treaty, the Algeciras Act, which solemnly proclaimed the 
integrity and independence of Morocco and which provided, 
in effect, that all Treaties, Conventions and Arrangements 
precedently negotiated between the Powers and Morocco 
should be superseded by the Algeciras Act.^ 

The present chapter will therefore be devoted in part to 
a recapitulation, in part to an amplification, of the events 
briefly referred to in Chapter VIII. 

With the close of the Algeciras Conference, two oppos- 
ing currents became plainly visible in the French outlook 
upon Moroccan affairs and persisted with varying fortunes 
almost up to the middle of 1909, when one of the two be- 
came engulfed in the swollen dimensions of the other. We 
have seen^ that the Parliamentary Committee reporting 
to the Chamber on the Algeciras^ Act had recognised that 
the Madrid Convention of 1880 had '* made of Morocco an 
international question," that the Algeciras Act had con- 
firmed this international character, had imposed the priority 
of its stipulations over antecedent arrangements between 
Morocco and various of the signatory Powers, and had, in 
effect, drawn up an international Charter for Morocco of 
which the essential bases were the independence and in- 
tegrity of that State. To that programme one school of 
thought in France was sincerely desirous of loyally ad- 
hering, and as I shall have occasion to point out further 
on, an enlightened view of British national interests would 

i Article 123 of the Act : vide Chapter VI. 
2 Footnote, Chapter VII. 

99 



loo TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

have directed the considerable influence wielded by the 
British Government in the whole affair, in support of 
that school^ Its adherents were not confined to one Party. 
They naturally included the Socialists, and their eloquent 
leader M. Jean Jaur^s ; but they also included the general 
opponents (of varying political views) both in Parliament 
and in the editorial offices, of the Delcass6 tradition of 
ostracising and offending Germany. And in the Chamber 
they possessed, with the help of the Socialists, a large 
majority. Indeed, men of weight and substance even in the 
Colonial Party itself were to be found on that side, although 
very much in the minority. What may, for lack of a better 
description, be termed the moderate Imperial view in this 
regard as distinct from the political or the purely Socialist 
view, was tersely expressed by M. Augustin Bernard at the 
North African Congress held at Paris as recently as 
October, 1908 : — 

** We desire" — said M. Bernard — "a Mbrocco free and 
independent as the Emperor William remarked at Tangier; 
we are more interested than any one that it should be so. 
We are concerned that no Power should establish itself in 
Morocco. 2 But it does not follow that we wish to establish 
ourselves in Morocco. There is for France a paramount 
interest that no one should infringe the independence of 
Morocco, but we are entitled to exercise in that country, 
Algeria's neighbour, a preponderating influence." 

On the other hand, the necessity of coming to some 
understanding with Germany if a free hand was to be 
secured in Morocco was also recognised even in the 
Councils of the Colonial Party (though here again it was 
rather a case of vox clamantis in deserto). Nevertheless it 
is notable that at this same Congress no less an authority 
than M. Rene Millet declared that : — 

** If we wish Germany to leave us in peace in Morocco, 
we must offer her satisfaction elsewhere." 

The opposing school consisted of the great bulk of the 
Colonial Party, dealing specially with Morocco under the 
name of the Comite du Maroc, composed of, or in touch 

1 Vide Chapter XIX. 

2 The secret Franco-Spanish Convention of 1904, whereby Lord 
Lansdowne had secured that Mediterranean and North Atlantic 
Morocco should not come into French hands, was, of course, still 
unpublished. 



FRENCH IGNORANCE loi 

with, genuinely convinced upholders of a Tunis ification of 
Morocco, financiers who were engaged in the process of 
strangling Morocco, and the value of whose securities stood 
to rise with a French occupation, concession hunters, land 
grabbers and speculators, and their journalistic partners; 
the ''forwards" of the Algerian political and military staffs, 
and the anti-Germans. This school was *' out for " absorp- 
tion and conquest at the earliest possible moment, for 
elbowing to one side German " pretensions " and the Act 
of Algeciras together. It was destined to carry the day. 

It should be pointed out once more that the French 
Parliamentary and general Public (apart from a jew 
politicians and journalists in the swim, so to speak) were 
totally ignorant of the secret Articles of the Anglo-French 
Declaration and of the secret Franco-Spanish Convention. 
They had not the remotest idea that the Morocco dangled 
before their eyes was not the Morocco of the maps but a 
Morocco in which Spain had been placed by Britain*s 
insistence and assistance in prospective possession of the 
Mediterranean and North Atlantic littorals, *' a Morocco 
decapitated and mutilated,'^ as M. Dubois bitterly ex- 
claimed in the Chamber on December i8 last; " a Morocco 
bereft of all its Mediterranean ports, but with a magnificent 
view of . . . the Sahara,*' as his opposition colleague, M. 
Delahaye, lamented on the same occasion. Had these secret 
arrangements been known it is safe to say that the 
opponents of the policy of conquest and violation of 
international treaty obligations would have been so 
immensely strengthened that the world would have been 
spared the events of the past year, and their actual and 
future consequences. In order to appreciate how utterly 
British public opinion has been misled in the matter, not 
only as regard* German policy and its motives, but as 
regards the real state of French opinion, it is necessary for 
Englishmen to understand that the policy of aggression 
pursued in Morocco after Algeciras through the weakness 
and vacillation of successive French Governments exercis- 
ing their precarious tenure beneath the pressure of the 
Comite du Maroc on the one hand, and the unsanctioned 
activities of the military, inspired from Algiers, on the 
other, was not (as Englishmen have been persistently 
taught to believe) a national policy ; but, on the contrary, 
was a policy pursued against the repeatedly declared wishes 
of the French people expressed through their Parliamentary 
representatives. It is surely one of the most astounding 



I02 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

features in this astounding story of two great peoples in- 
volved by their respective diplomats in an international 
quarrel which brought them to the verge of war in ignor- 
ance of the true inwardness of the quarrel, that from the 
close of igo6 down to the very eve of the Fez expedition the 
French Chamber passed resolution after resolution by 
large majorities expressive of its determination to observe 
the Algeciras Act and disclaiming intervention in the 
internal affairs of Morocco.^ And yet, swiftly and surely, 
step by step, France was all the time being imperceptibly 
dragg-ed into the adventure which was to bring her into 
collision once more with Germany. Now, clever as were 
the wire-pullers behind the scenes, they could not have 
succeeded if the French people had known what lay beneath- 
it all — viz. , the arrangement to divide Morocco with Spain 
when the Sultan's authority no longer prevailed (which 
authority the militaires and the coloniaux were putting 
forth all their energies to destroy). The conditions would 
then have been clearly realised, and French public opinion, 
which did not desire further trouble with Germany, would 
have immediately perceived that what its colonials and 
jingoes were preparing was another edition of the incidents 
of 1905. Morocco, at least the non-Spanish part of it, 
would have ultimately passed under French sway, but later, 
and the event would have been preceded by a friendly under- 
standing with Germany. 

No case quite analogous to this one is, I think, any- 
where recorded. There could be no more poignant illus- 
tration of the utter helplessness of modern democracies in 
the face of secret-treaty-making diplomats — the paid 
servants, forsooth, of the State whose citizens are as clay 
in the hands of the potter ! 

It is difficult fittingly to comment •on the lavishly 
distributed and perfervid declarations of the French 
Government during this period, such as M. Pichon's (the 
new Foreign Minister) statement to an assembly of 
Parisian journalists on October 28, 1906, in the Journal 
on December 4, and to the Neues Weiner Tagblatt on 

winter alia. [I may have missed some]. December 6, 1906 ; 
November 12, 1907; January 24 and 28, 1908; June 19, 1908; Decem- 
- ber 23, 1908; January 10, 1909; November 23, 1909; March 24, 1911. 
The Chambers said, " No," preserve the rights of France, but uphold 
Algeciras; the wire-pullers said to the Government, "If you don't 
move we'll throw you out." The politicians in power preferred to* 
remain in possession of it I 



HOW DEMOCRACY WAS MISLED 103 

December 25 of the same year, etc. Or take, as a sample 
of more official languag-e, his despatch to the French 
ckargd d'affaires at Madrid on March 30, 1907, after the 
Udja affair — the first open violation of Morocco territory : — 

** Our action on Udja is not a step towards Fez. We 
are resolved to maintain our intervention u^ithin the limit 
which we fixed at the outset." 

And so after Casablanca, and so before and after Fez. 
It is all very nauseous, and if one had any illusions left 
after plunging through these labyrinthine intrigues, it 
would be very disillusioning. 

Suffice it to say that while in Paris they were jurant 
leurs grande Dieux (*' swearing their great gods ") that 
nothing was more remote from their minds than an inva- 
sion of Morocco, Morocco itself was all the while being 
steadily absorbed, a mouthful here, a mouthful there, pre- 
paratory to the final meal. 

Two little incidents marking this period of boa-con- 
strictor assimilation, trivial in their way, perhaps, are 
nevertheless- of interest as throwing light upon two aspects 
of the Morocco problem. The first shows what the Moors 
might have accomplished if Europe had shown a modicum 
of honesty in dealing with them, if Europe had helped them 
to clear out the devil on their hearths instead of introduc- 
ing seven other devils worse than the first. The small town 
of Arzila, twenty-five miles from Tangier, had been cap- 
tured by brigands. The affair was enormously magnified 
as indicating the powerlessness of the unhappy Moorish 
Government; as a matter of fact, the " brigands " num- 
bered . . . twenty-five ! The disloyal Moorish Governor 
of the district — Raisuli — had recaptured the place and used 
the additional prestige conferred upon him thereby to defy 
the Sultan more or less openly. He was said to have a 
numerous following, and his conduct provided another 
theme for numerous homilies on the anarchy of Morocco. 
The chauvinists eagerly seized upon the opportunity, right 
deftly were the strings pulled, and a small landing party 
from a French cruiser at Tangier, having had a few stones 
flung at tbem by Moorish wastrels about the same time, 
the French and Spanish Government made solemn prepara- 
tions for the despatch of a strong naval force " capable of 
dealing with any emergency," and, if necessary, of 
"landing detachments." After portentous discussion, a 
Franco-Spanish note was drawn up and despatched to the 



I04 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Powers. 1 A little more and the Sultan's authority in the 
Tangier district would have been replaced by that of his 
kind Latin friends. Inspired, so it was announced at the 
time, by the wicked Teuton, the Sultan perceived the 
dang-er and despatched an army of 2,000 men to Tangier. 
Arzila was reoccupied, Raisula's forces which were going 
to annihilate the Sultan's troops melted away without firing 
a shot, Raisuli himself was publicly dismissed and 
promptly made himself scarce. The Sultan was just too 
quick for the " liberating " Armada, which was about to 
set out from Cadiz and Toulon ! The second incident 
illustrates the esteem which Germany had acquired in the 
eyes of the Moors by the stand her legitimate interests had 
caused her to make for their independence. The Moorish 
Governor, Ulai Hafid of Marakesh, publicly thanked the 
German residents for attending the celebrations connected 
with the Bariam festival, saying : — 

** The presence of your countrymen at to-day's celebra- 
tions is a double pleasure to me, inasmuch as it is a proof 
of the friendship existing between your Emperor and my 
illustrious master and brother, the Sultan, and also because 
just now conditions, particularly in the south of the Empire 
where I am Khalif , are wilfully represented as affording no 
security of the person, while complaints are made concern- 
ing events which are partly pure inventions and partly 
artificially produced. ' ' 

It seems useless to recount in detail the peripatetics of 
the Morocco question throughout the four years, 1907-1910 
— of which, indeed, something has been told in Chapter 
VIII., especially on the financial side. It suffices to say 
that, with resources mortgaged to international finance (let 
the reader bear in mind that the whole of the customs were 
mortgaged to guarantee the interest to European bond- 
holders on the two loans — to the extent of 60 per cent, on 
the 1904 loan, and 40 per cent, on the 1910 loan) ; rent by 
internal disturbances and civil war ; its territory violated ; 
its coffers empty ; its subjects ground with taxation ; com- 
pelled to perpetrate abuses in order to sustain itself and 
feed its troops ; intrigued against by the French on every 
hand ; harassed with incessant demands for apologies and 
reforms and compensations ; its prestige irrevocably 
impaired ; with French expeditionary columns foraging 

1 December 5, 1906. 



SPAIN DECLINES TO BE LEFT BEHIND 105 

:in every direction from their base in the Shawiya ; the 
Moorish Government fell to pieces, while the country itself 
sunk into bloody chaos. And, concurrently, Franco- 
German rivalry in Morocco and in Europe became intensi- 
fied. In Morocco the official representatives of Germany 
fought to preserve the international machinery set up by 
the Algeciras Act, while German firms sought to push their 
-commerce and their enterprises. The official representa- 
tives of France, both civil and military, fought with equal 
energy, and in the case of the latter fought literally to 
break that international machinery and to promote French 
interests, political, commercial, and, above all, speculative, 
in a whole series of localities, by operations often of a most 
'disgraceful character. ^ In Europe the French and German 
newspapers abused one another with copious invective, and 
the anti-German British newspapers joined in the fray — 
■always, of course, on the side of the French. 

To the clamour of the French fife and the German 
bassoon was now added, in the closing months of 1910, the 
rattle of the Spanish castanets. Spain had been getting 
increasingly uneasy at the prolongation of the French 
military occupation and at the ever-growing perimeter of 
the French military operations. Her politicians began to 
wonder whether the contemptuous disregard of the 
Algeciras Act by the French would not be followed by 
^equally high-handed proceedings towards Spanish claims 
as defined in the secret Franco-Spanish Convention which, 
failing the application of the Algeciras Act, Spain was 
resolved to maintain. Questions and complaints multiplied 
themselves in the Cortes and Senate, and the newspapers 
harangued. To Spanish grumbling official France con- 
tinued to oppose the entire " correctness " of its intentions 
as proclaimed in the resolutions of the Chamber and the 
pledges of its public men, which, to be sure, were numerous 
enough. In these assurances the Spaniards appeared to 
find but cold comfort in view of what had actually taken 
place on the spot. So they sent large reinforcements to 
their existing garrisons in the Riff, and began the occu- 
pation of the outlying districts of the zone which, under 
the Convention, fell to Spain. The tone of the French 
Press thereupon became openly threatening. 

iThe ** Udja " scandals have been filling the French Press for 
-months and the Times Tangier correspondent has courageously 
exposed others. 



io6 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMAO'- 

And now the curtain goes up upon the final scene- 
which is to witness the triumph of the Comite du Maroc. 
In April, 191 1, Fez is reported blocked by insurgents and' 
the Europeans in danger ; General Moinier sets out for its 
I relief at the head of 30,000 men, and the French Govern- 

i ment, continuing its everlasting assurances of respect fur 

the integrity and independence of Morocco, announces 
that General Moinier will withdraw to the coast after- 
succouring the menaced Europeans. Sir Edward Grey 
declares in the House of Commons that the march on Fez- 
has his approval. The German Government at once issues 
through the North German Gazette the warning which, as- 
we now know and as will be subsequently explained,^ it then 
addressed to France. If the French Government, declares, 
in effect the official organ of the German Government^ 
considers its subjects to be in danger, Germany, while not 
in receipt of similar information so far as German subjects^ 
are concerned, sees no cause to oppose that view, but, 
taking note of the French Government's public pledges not 
to occupy the capital, expresses the hope that it will succeed 
in carrying out its programme. Were the French Govern- 
ment to fail to fulfil its pledges the Act of Algeciras would' 
finally have ceased to exist, and full freedom of independent 
action would be automatically restored to the signatory. 
Powers. So Britain approves, Germany warns, and the 
storm approaches. 

Spain, however, is not content with a vv^arning. She 
takes immediate action, pouring more troops into the Riff \. 
and, prosecuting further her intention not to be jockeyed 
out of any of her rights under the secret Convention, sends 
a strong force to occupy manu militari Larash and 
El-Kasr in the North Atlantic section of the zone. Thus, 
Spain's answer to the occupation of Fez. 

Furious clamour arises in Paris. ^ The Comity du Maroc 
moves heaven and earth to prevent the Government from 
giving the order for the evacuation of Fez, and the chau- 
vinist organs use language of unveiled menace to Spain. 
May closes with General Moinier still at Fez, and the 
sentiments precedently prevailing both in Germany and in^ 
Spain as to the validity of the urgency pleaded by France 

1 Chapter XX. 

2 Very different, as we shall see presently, to the calm which- 
generally prevailed, when the Panther anchored, off Agadir. IFa: 
clamoured then ! 



THE STORY OF THE FEZ EXPEDITION 107 

for her march upon the capital, are strengthened by the 
inconvenient revelations which begin to appear, even in 
the French Press, as to the non-existence at any time of any 
panic among the Europeans in the capital and, per contra, 
the existence therein of plentiful supplies. 

One of the best informed and the most distinguished of 
French publicists, M. Francis de Pressens6, has with 
accuracy and scorn painted the true picture of the Fez 
comedy, and as it is a piece of excellent writing, I give it 
in lieu of any description of my own — 

'* Nevertheless matters were still not suSciently to the 
liking of the impressarii. To justify the financial operation 
which was to crown the sordid tragic-comedy, something 
■else was still needed. And at this point the Comite du 
Maroc and its organs surpassed themselves. They 
organised a campaign of systematic untruth. Masters oi 
almost the entire press, they swamped the public with false 
news. Fez was represented as threatened by siege or 
sack. A whole European French colony was suddenly 
■discovered there living in anguish. The ultimate fate of 
the women and children was described in the most moving 
terms. Even in the absence of independent information 
one could not fail to be struck by the singular con- 
tradictions of these alarmist despatches. Now, Fez 
was lost because the Mehallah commanded by a French 
instructor was away. Anon the return of the said 
Mehallah was calculated to lose Fez. One day, the 
alarmed public learned that the town had undergone a 
formidable assault. The next day the public was gravely 
told that the rebels had not yet assembled, but in a few days 
would surround Fez with a circle of iron and flame. 
The most lamentable details were given of the state of 
the expeditionary Mehallah which only possessed an 
insignificant quantity of cartridges and shells, but this 
did not prevent the subsequent announcement that, 
thanks to the heroism of its leader, it had achieved a 
great victory and scattered the enemy with a hailstorm 
of shot and shell. Finally it was affirmed that in case of 
siege the city was only provisioned for two or three weeks. 
Thus carefully cooked, public opinion soon took fire. What 
was the Government thinking of ? At all cost the 
Europeans, the Sultan, Fez itself must be saved. ... As 
ever, from the beginning of this enterprise, the 
Government knew nothing, willed nothing of itself. With 



io8 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

a salutary dread of complications it would have preferred? 
not to move, perhaps, even, had it dared, to withdraw from 
the hornet's nest. But the greater fears it experienced 
from another quarter prevailed ; those inculcated by the 
so-called patriotic shoutings, the concerted clamours of 
the orchestra of which the ComiU du Maroc holds the 
hdton, and whose chief performers are to be found in Le 
Temps and Le Matin. The order to advance was given. 
. . . Already while the expedition was on its way, light 
began to pierce. Those redoubtable rebels who were 
threatening Fez had disappeared like the dew in the- 
morning. Barely did a few ragged horsemen fire off a 
shot or two before turning round and riding away at at 
furious gallop. A too disingenuous, or too truthful, 
correspondent gave the show away. The expeditionary 
force complains, he gravely records, of the absence of the 
enemy ; the approaching harvest season is keeping all the 
healthy males in the fields ! Thus did the phantom so 
dextrously conjured by the Comite du Maroc for the benefit 
of its aims disappear in a night. . . . Avowals and 
disclosures then began in right earnest. One of the 
correspondents who had contributed his share to the 
concert of lying news, wrote with an admirable sang-froid 
that, in truth, there had been some exaggeration, that, in 
point of fact, at no moment had the safety of Fez and its. 
inhabitants been seriously menaced ; that the idea of a 
regular siege and of a sudden capture had been alike 
chimerical and that, moreover, so far as the provisioning^ 
of the place was concerned, he could reassure the most 
timorous that there was sufficient corn in the city to feed 
the whole population, plus the expeditionary column, for 
more than a year ! The farce was played. After Casa- 
blanca, Fez. France, without realising it, without wishing 
it, almost without knowing it, had taken a decisive step. 
An indefinite occupation of the capital was the natural 
prelude to a Protectorate. For the clever men who had 
invented and executed the scenario there oAly now 
remained the task of reaping the fruit of their efforts. The 
era of concessions, profits, dividends was about to open. 
Premature joyfulness ! It was the era of difficulties which 
was at hand." 

Such was the operation with which the British Foreign 
Office hastened diplomatically to identify itself. Not only 
so — but to take upon itself, and to impose upon an ill- 



WHAT WE SUPPORTED 



109 



informed British public, the defence of all the international 
consequences following from that operation, and, under 
cover of vague talk about ** British interests " (where none 
were involved), to compromise British interests to the 
extent of risking a European conflagration. 

The close of June saw the French Government still 
protesting its "correctness"; General Moinier still in 
occupation of Fez; the entire country between the coast 
and the capital overrun by French troops; with Spain 
strengthening her position at Larash, El-Kasr, and in the 
Gharb generally, fighting in the Riff and descending upon 
Ifni; Morocco in the death-throes — and the Panther en 
route for Agadir. 



PART VIII. 

Germany's Second Intervention (191 1) and the ensuing 
Anglo-German Crisis. 



18] 



CHAPTER XVIIL 

WAS GERMANY JUSTIFIED IN SENDING THE '' PANTHF.R " 
TO AGADIR? 

As in 1905, SO in 1911, events had compelled the German 
Government to assume a decided position in the Morocco 
affair. And as the German Emperor's visit to Tangier in 
1905 had been described as "dramatic" and "tempes- 
tuous," so the despatch of the Panther to Agadir has been 
denounced as diplomacy of an "aggressive" and 
" brutal " kind. It was certainly less subtle than the dip- 
lomacy which Germany had to contend against. This 
diplomacy had started by ignoring altogether Germany's 
right to be consulted in the future of Morocco, secretly par- 
titioning that State between France and Spain, while loudly 
professing the intention of maintaining its independence. 
That was period number one. Then, in the teeth of the 
Algeciras Act, by which, thanks to Germany's intervention, 
the integrity of Morocco had been guaranteed, this same 
diplomacy, while professing to respect that integrity, had 
intrigued, manoeuvred, and acted until, little by little, 
Germany was confronted with an accomplished fact — to 
wit, the substitution of a French Protectorate over Morocco 
upon the ashes of the Algeciras Act. And throughout both 
periods it had manoeuvred successfully to convince public 
opinion of its eminent straightforwardness. The contrast 
between the complacency with which the exploits of France 
and Spain had been accepted in the quarters that greeted 
the advent of the little German gunboat off Agadir^ with 
horrified cries of outraged propriety, is certainly comic. 

Germany's action in this regard has, however, been 
widely condemned even by those who have admitted the 
shabby treatment which Germany has received all through 
this miserable business. Let us look at the matter a little 
closer and put one or two pertinent questions. 

Short of acquiescing in the, by then, undisguised 
destruction of the Act of Algeciras, and thus throwing up. 
her whole case, what could Germany have done? She 

1 It has been repeatedly stated that the Panther " occupied "^ Agadir. 
There was, of course, never any occupation. 



114 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACV 

•should have insisted, urge some critics, upon a return to 
the status quo, i.e., the status quo established by the Act 
of Algeciras. But how? How was that possible with 
nearly 100,000 French and Spanish troops in Morocco, 
with a French army of occupation established in the capital, 
with the Sultan's authority gone never to return? Morocco 
as an independent political entity had, in point of fact, 
ceased to exist. That Germany would have been within her 
legal rights in demanding a return to the status quo is 
obvious. It was that self-evident fact which made her 
position impregnable internationally whatever she chose to 
do, and despite all the screaming on the other side. But at 
the stage matters had reached France could no more have 
evacuated Morocco without national humiliation than 
Germany could have accepted defeat and retired beaten 
from the diplomatic field without humiliation. That was 
the impasse to which the Colonial Party in France and the 
Forward School in Algeria, with the concurrence of the 
British Foreign Office, had brought matters. 

// Germany had desired war she would either have 
demanded a return to the status quo with its indispensable 
accompaniment, the withdrawal of the French and Spanish 
military forces from the soil of Morocco, whose integrity, 
formally proclaimed by the Public Law of Europe, their 
presence upon it violated. Or she would have sent not a 
two -penny -half -penny gunboat to Agadir: but half a dozen 
m,en-o'-war, landed troops and done at Agadir and in the 
Sus what France had done at Casablanca and in the 
Shawiya, what Spain had done at Larash and in the Gharb 
— and with justification at least equal to theirs. For did 
the Algeciras Act authorise France and Spain any more 
than it authorised Germany to occupy Moroccan territory ? 
Will it be seriously contended that because of an affray 
between European workmen and the Moorish populace at 
Casablanca, France was morally or legally entitled to bom- 
bard that town and spread her soldiers over the Shawiya 
district^; or that Spain was morally or legally entitled to 
make a descent upon Larash and El-Kasr, without, so 
far as the Moors were concerned, the very ghost of a 
pretext ? 

1 In that case — seeing that the Act of Algeciras had proclaimed the 
integrity of Morocco — England would have been equally justified in 
occupying, shall we say Mequinez, because Mr. Madden was murdered 
at Mazagan (January 10, 1908). 



HAD GERMANY WANTED WAR 115 

Had Germany wanted war her course was clearly 
indicated, and it has been one of the most shameful 
features of the persistent misleading of the British public 
in favour of a diplomacy immoral from its inception, that 
Germany, the provoked party, has been represented both 
in the crisis of 1905 and in the crisis of 191 1 — crises 
entirely brought about by that diplomacy — as working for 
war. 

I submit that, intrinsically, Germany must be held to 
have been entitled to raise the question of the legality of 
the new situation created by France, in such manner as 
would compel a final settlement of the problem. To assert, 
as Sir Edward Grey and the newspapers who' support 
his policy have asserted, that the new situation 
was created by Germany in despatching the Panther to 
Agadir, is to fly in the face of the most patent and 
irrefutable facts. It is easy to make such an assertion 
before an ill-informed Parliament and to a worse-informed 
public. But it is impossible for anyone to prove it in 
argument. Whether the German Government could have 
selected any other form of effective protest against the 
attempt to elbow Germany out of her lawful position, 
appears doubtful. At any rate, no alternative between the 
acceptance of defeat and a summons which must have 
resulted in war has been suggested by Germany's critics. 

But, if, intrinsically, and taking her stand upon the 
Public Law of Europe, Germany was justified in calling a 
halt to the actual process of a Franco-Spanish partition and 
occupation of Morocco, she had also the justification in a 
series of negotiations carried on with France subsequent 
not only to the Algeciras Act, but to that Franco-German 
Declaration of February, 1909, the text of which is given ; 
in Chapter VI., and which described both Powers as equally I 
anxious to facilitate the execution of the Act. As will ha\e 
been observed from the terms of that Declaration, the Ger- 
man Government, far from pursuing a policy of bitter ill • 
will towards France in Morocco (which has been laid to hei 
charge by persons in this country who, if the truth weie 
known, are much less concerned with that idea than they 
are by the fear of seeing France and Germany draw closer 
to one another) had taken an important step towards 
dissipating the Moroccan shadow which clouded Franco 
German relations. It is, perhaps, worthy of note also that 



ii6 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

already in January of the same year, when Mulai-Hafid, 
the Sultan of Morocco, applied to Germany for the loan of 
military instructors, Germany informed France of the 
request and declined to grant it. It may, then, be recallea 
that, while extracting from the French Government a 
renewed declaration of firm attachment to the independence 
and integrity of Morocco, the German Government by this 
Declaration had confirmed in more precise terms than those 
used in the Exchange of Notes of July, 1905, its recogni- 
tion of special French interests in Morocco ; had proclaimed 
' that Germany's interests in Morocco were purely economic, 
and had paved the way to co-operation in economic ques- 
tions. Both Governments had interpreted the reference to 
economic co-operation as applying not only to Morocco 
but to other parts of Africa where their mutual interests 
touched, and the Agreement was soon followed by the 
initiation of comprehensive negotiations covering a wide 
field of business enterprise. These had relation, in 
Morocco, to the famous Union des Mines, an international 
Association constituted in 1907, whose founders and 
adherents comprised powerful French, German, British, 
Spanish, Italian, Austrian, Belgian, and Portuguese manu- 
facturers, bankers, and even political personages^; to the 
Societe Marocaine des Travaux puhliques, another inter- 
national concern like the Morocco' Tobacco Monopoly,'^ 
with French, German, British, and Spanish capital ; finally 
to the participation of Franco-German capital in the con- 
struction of railways in various parts of Morocco. 

Outside Morocco, in the French Congo and German 
Cameroons, the negotiations affected conflicting economic 
interests which had long given rise tO' friction, and in one 
case — the affair of Missum-Missum^ — to armed collision 
between a German military detachment and the Agent 



iThe French " group " included the Cle. des Forges de Chatillon- 
Commentry et Neuves Maisons, Schneider et Cie., Banque francaise 
pour le commerce et I'lndustrie, Count Armande, etc. ; the German 
■" group " included Krupps, the Metallurgische Gesellschaft of Frank- 
furt, the Nationalbank fur Deutschland of Berlin, etc. ; the British 
■*' group " included A. E. Harris, of Harris Dixon, Ltd., London, Mr. 
Bonar Law, M.P., Mr. W. B. Harrig, correspcfndent of the Times at 
Tangier, etc. ; the Spanish " group " included the Marquis de Villame- 
jor, and so on. Vide L'Humdnite, of March, 191 1, which published 
Si list of them. Vide also Manchester Guardian of May 8, 191 1. 

2 Society international de regi& co-interessee des tahacs du Maroc, in 
-which the Paris and Netherlands Bank, Mendelsohn and Co., Sir 
Ernest Cassel, and others, were interested. 



ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION [17 

of a French Concessionnaire Company. The genesis of 
these incidents lay on the one part in the rivalries of 
German merchants and French concessionnaire companies, 
on the other to ill-defined frontiers and absence of means 
of communication. To put an end to these irritating 
affairs by a combination of the clashing interests at stake 
and to elaborate a scheme for Franco-German railway 
construction, was the desire of the German Government, 
and, to all seeming, that of the French politicians with 
whom that Government successively negotiated. Discus- 
sion continued all through 1909, 1910, and down to June, 
191 1, with a uniform ill-success which appeared in German 
eyes, systematic, and which has since been pdblicly 
admitted in numerous quarters in France, to have been 
deplorable and well-calculated to annoy the German 
Government. •'■ 

It is no part of my task to disentangle the innumerable 
financial, personal, and political intrigues with which these 
^* conversations" were honeycombed on the French side, 
still less to apportion responsibility with the magnificent 
assurance displayed in certain editorial offices in London. 
Broadly speaking two tendencies were at work— pro- 
German and anti-German — in French official and political 
life, throughout this period, as they ^\ere in the period 
immediately following Agadir ; and these tendencies were 
reflected in the actions of respective members of the 
Cabinets which succeeded one another with such bewilder- 
ing rapidity last year.^ Behind them, and mixed up with 
them, all kinds of strings were being pulled by individuals 
with axes of their own to grind. 

Confining one's self merely to what is now established, 
there is no denying that the German Government was 
confronted with a state of affairs which, as it developed, 
became inextricably chaotic. Side by side with official 

^ Vide the Debates in the French Chamber (December, 191 1) and 
Senate (February, 1912) ; the published summaries of the examinations 
of Ministers and others by the French Senatorial Committee (January, 
191 2); numerous articles in Le Temps, La Libert^, and, notably, the 
articles in La Repuhlique franfaise by the well-known Deputy, M. 
Jules Roche (January 9, 1912, et sequitur) ; the revelation attending 
the resignation of M. de Selves and the Caillaux Cabinet (January, 
1912), etc., etc. 

,2 The Briand Cabinet fell at the end of February, 191 1. It was 
succeeded by the Monis Cabinet which fell at the end of June ; to be in 
turn succeeded by the Caillaux Cabinet. (The Caillaux Cabinet 
resigned in January, 1912, to be succeeded by the Poincar^ Cabinet.) 



ii8 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

overtures, proposals were put forward now by one Minister^ 
now by several Ministers, only to be subsequently ex- 
plained away or withdrawn. There were official " con- 
versations " and private " conversations " ; emissaries said 
to be authorised passed to and fro : inopportune dis- 
closures in the Paris Press added tO' the confusion, which 
was made worse confounded by constant Cabinet changes. 
The negotiations made no progress. One combination 
after another fell through. The growing irritation in 
German official circles reached its climax with the collapse 
of the so-called consortium, an arrangement whereby the 
N*Goko Sangha Company (whose concession extended to 
the German border and in whose undelimited territory 
frequent disputes had occurred with German merchants) 
was to have become a Franco-German Chartered Company 
with police rights over an extensive area of the French 
Congo. An agreement had actually been signed in regard 
to this matter in December, 1910, between M. Pichon, 
Foreign Minister in the Briand Ministry, and Ihe head of 
the German "group," subject to the approval of the 
Chamber. The Biland Ministry, having ascertained that 
the feeling of the Chamber was hostile for the reason 
explained in the footnote further on, dropped the matter 
and reopened it on a somewhat different basis with the 
German Embassy in Paris. A final agreement was signed 
on February 15, 191 1, subject to the approval of the 
Chamber. But Parliamentary and public hostility to the 
consortium had steadily grown, and M. Briand's fall from 
power, attributed at the time to internal questions, was due 
to the certainty he had acquired that if he faced the 
Chamber with this consortium, his defeat, under circum- 
stances prejudicial to his future political career, was 
inevitable. The Monis Ministry came in, and, a fortnight 
later, M. Messimy, Colonial Minister in that Ministry,* 
announced to the Chamber the Government's intention of 
abandoning the consortium. The rebuff to Germany was 
direct and all the more exasperating since the Monis 
Ministry was, at the very time it was inflicted, making 
no secret of its intention to send French troops to Fez.'^ 

1 Afterwards War Minister in the Caillaux Cabinet. 

2 The consortium, excellent in principle, was vitiated by the 
" indemnity " which the French side of the arrangement stipulated 
should be handed over to the N'Goko Sangha Company as a charge 
upon the budget of the French Congo, already in a parlous state. 
Many causes contributed to make of this payment a " job '^ of the 



THE FAILURE OF NEGOTIATIONS 119 

Before the Monis Ministry fell (end of June), General 
Moinier's army was in occupation of the capital of 
Morocco. 

When it became quite clear that the French were at 
Fez to stay, the German Government made up its mind 
that the time had come to move, although desultory 
negotiations on several points (notably the French-Congo 
Cameroons railway scheme) were still going on. The fah 
of the Monis Cabinet at the end of June placed M. Caillaux 
in power with M. de Selves as Foreign Minister [June 28]. 
Three days later the German ambassador at Paris informed 
the new French Ministry that the Panther had been 
despatched to Agadir. 

The German Government which, in the previous May 
— i.e., at the time of the expedition to Fez — had informed 
the French Government that it reserved henceforth com- 
plete liberty of action in connection with the Morocco 
question, 1 made known the step it had taken to the 
signatory Powers of the Act of Algeciras in the following 
despatch communicated to those Powers by Germany's 
accredited representatives : — 

" Some German firms established in the south of 
Morocco, notably at Agadir and in the vicinity, have been 
alarmed by a certain ferment among the local tribes, due, 
it seems, to the recent occurrences in other parts of the 
Country. These firms have applied to the Imperial 
Government for protection for their lives and property. 
At their request the Imperial Government have decided 
to send a warship to the port of Agadir to lend help and 



worst description, and both it and its principal advocate, M. Tardieu, 
Foreign Editor of Le Temps, an extremely able, but most dangerous 
factor in French political life, were furiously assailed by Felicien 
Challaye, Pierre Mille, Peaix-Seailles, and other high-minded and 
honourable Frenchmen connected with the French League for the 
Defence of the Congo natives, as much in the interests of the 
natives as of public morality. Their opposition led to a Parliamentary 
investigation which concluded in rejecting the whole transaction. See 
in this connection more particularly the French Parliamentary Paper 
No. 376 of 191 1 ; numerous articles in the Courrier europeen, Journal 
de Geneve, DepecTie de Toulouse, etc., and my own letter to the Daily 
News on October 3, 1911, based upon Felicien Challaye's "Politique 
internationale et journalisme d'affaires " (Paris, Felix Alcan), particu- 
larly interesting to English readers, as it reveals the very suggestive 
and highly unpleasant fact of the existence of relations between M. 
Tardieu and the British Foreign Office. 
1 Vide Chapter XX. 



I20 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

assistance in case of need to their subjects and proteges 
as well as to the considerable German interests in the 
territory in question. As soon as the state of affairs in 
Morocco has resumed its former quiet aspect the ship 
charg-ed with this protective mission shall leave the port of 
Agadir. 

** Please convey this information verbally to the 
Government to which you are accredited, if possible, on 
Saturday at noon, leaving the text as an aide-memoire. 

** KiDERLEN. " 

That the German Government would have strengthened 
its position in the eyes of the world by laying less stress 
upon the alarm of German firms and by stating the further 
reasons dictating its resolve, is certain. When one reviews 
carefully the whole position, however, one is led to the 
conclusion that such a procedure would have been unwise 
unless the German Government desired a rupture, probably 
resulting in war, which it is quite obvious the German 
Government did not. And for this reason, however 
diplomatically worded, a statement of the German case at 
that juncture, and in an official communication to foreign 
Powers, would have conveyed a censure upon French 
action, and, consequently, upon British approval of French 
action,^ which would have immediately resulted in a very 
strained situation. Such a course would, moreover, have 
rendered virtually impossible the prosecution or rather the 
continuation of direct negotiations with France which it 
was the aim of German policy to promote. At first sight, 
too, one might be disposed to blame the German Govern- 
ment for not having incorporated in its communication a 
more explicit disavowal of any intention to occupy Agadir. 
On the other hand, it must be borne in mind that the 
German Government had, in its Agreement with France in 
February, 1909, categorically proclaimed its interests in 
Morocco to be purely economic, which was not, indeed, the 
enunciation of a new attitude but the confirmation of the 
attitude to which it had consistently adhered. Nevertheless 
one cannot help feeling that the German Government would 
have been well advised to have disclaimed once more, at 
that moment, and, categorically, all political and territorial 
designs. No doubt it did so to the various Governments 

iSir Edward Grey had, in the House of Commons, publicly 
approved of the French march to Fez. 



THE GERMAN CASE 12. 

'Concerned, as we shall see later. But not to the world, 
officially at least — which gave a handle to its enemies. 

The opening portion of the German Chancellor's speech 
to the Reichstag on November 9 may, perhaps, be usefully 
reproduced here : — 

" The Algeciras Act was intended to maintain the inde- 
pendence of Morocco with 'a view to the economic develop- 
ment of the country for the benefit of the trade of all the 
Powers parties to it. It was soon evident that one of the 
•essential conditions was lacking, namely, a Sultan who was 
actual ruler of the country, and was in a position to carry 
out the reforms contemplated. Even Sultan Mulai-Hafid 
could not do so in spite of his personal qualities. He 
^became more and more dependent upon foreign influence, 
and came into constantly increasing conflict with the tribes 
of his own country in consequence. This led to ever- 
g-rowing influence on the part of France, for, of the four 
Powers which since the seventies possessed treaty rights to 
maintain military missions at the Sultan's Court, only the 
French Mission had succeeded in establishing its position. 
In the same way France had for long supplied Morocco 
with money. The position of the Sultan, surrounded by 
hostile tribes and shut up in Fez, became eventually so 
precarious that France informed the Powers that grave 
apprehensions must be felt for the lives and property of 
her officers at the Sultan's Court, and of the European 
colony. 

** France accordingly declared that she proposed to 
send troops to Fez, and to conduct the Europeans back to 
the coast. We had received no such threatening reports 
from Fez, and therefore declared that our colony did not 
require foreign assistance. Since, however, we could 
naturally assume no responsibility for the lives of the 
French citizens who were apparently threatened, we raised 
no objection to the advance to Fez to bring back the 
threatened French citizens to the coast. We added the 
•explicit reservation, however, which we also announced 
publicly, that we retained our liberty of action should the 
French expedition go beyond its alleged object, even should 
such action be merely the result of circumstances arising 
out of tlie expedition. This occurred, as was to be expected. 
Prance exerted practically unlimited sway over the relieved 
Sultan in virtue of her influence, which h^d gradually 
become absolute. The independence of the Sultan assumed 



122 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

by the Algeciras Act thus ceased to exist. It has, indeed^ 
been urged that the Sultan himself summoned the French 
to his assistance, but a ruler who summons foreign troops 
to his assistance, and who relies solely upon the support of 
foreign bayonets, is no longer the independent ruler on 
whose existence the Algeciras Act was based. We let this 
be known, and suggested to France an understanding, 
leaving, of course, the initiative to her. We indicated the 
general outlines only of our programme to the effect that 
we should be ready to take into account the altered position 
of France resulting from the changed conditions, but that in 
return we must demand more precise guarantees for the 
equality assured to us in the domain of commerce and 
industry, especially in regard to public works, besides com- 
pensations for the rights assumed by France without pre- 
vious understanding with us and going beyond the letter 
and spirit of the Algeciras Act. At first we received no 
positive proposals from Paris, whilst the French military 
power continued to spread in Morocco, and the fiction began 
gradually to become established, not only in France, but 
also v/ith the other Powers, that France was acting in 
pursuance of a European mandate. When, therefore^ 
German interests appeared to be threatened in consequence 
of the events in Morocco, we sent a warship to Agadir. 
The despatch of this ship was primarily intended for the 
protection of the lives and property of our subjects. It 
represented at the same time a clear intimation of our right 
and our intention to defend our subjects in Morocco just as 
independently as France protected hers, so long as she 
came to no understanding with us. This object of the 
despatch of our warship and its limitation to this object 
were announced, immediately before the arrival of the ship^ 
to the Powers through our Ambassadors and Ministers 
accredited to them. It is, accordingly, an untrue assertion 
if the despatch of a ship to Agadir was represented in the 
press — in the foreign press — as a provocation and a threat. 
We provoke and threaten no one ; but we protect our rights 
and we shall not allow ourselves to be deterred or hindered 
by any one. 

" The discussion with France then begart. " 

We have now to examine the respective manner in 
which the French and British Governments greeted the 
German official despatch. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

HOW THE DESPATCH OF THE " PANTHER '' TO AGADIR WAS 
GREETED IN PARIS AND LONDON RESPECTIVELY. 

3f one desired to select from an abundance of accessible 
material an ideally symptomatic introduction to the amaz- 
ing narrative of the policy pursued by the British diplo- 
matic machine towards Germany in the month of July, 
1911, one's choice would fall upon the incident which, by 
natural sequence and by no artificial device, takes its 
appointed place at the stage we have now reached in re- 
counting the exploits of "Morocco in Diplomacy." I 
allude to the profound divergence between the reception of 
the German notification by the French and British Govern- 
ments respectively. 

M. de Selves, Foreign Minister of the Power directly 
concerned and supposedly threatened, by Germany's 
^* brutal " act, went off to Holland with President 
Falli^res, and did not return to Paris until July 7.^ 

Sir Edward Grey, Foreign Secretary of a Power indi- 
rectly concerned, apprised, as was M. de Selves on July i, 
sent for the German ambassador on July 3, summoned a 
Cabinet meeting, held it, sent for the German ambassador 
on July 4, told him that "a new situation had been 
created," and that the British Government ** could not 
recognise any new arrangement that might be come to 
without " it. On July 6 Mr. Asquith^ stated in the House 
that he wished it " clearly to be understood that his 
Majesty's Government consider that a new situation has 
arisen in Morocco, in which it is possible that future de- 
velopments may affect British interests more directly than 
has been the case." After expressing confidence that 
" diplomatic discussion " would find a solution, the Prime 
Minister went on to say that ** in the part we shall take in 
it we shall have due regard to the protection of those 
interests and to the fulfilment of our treaty obligations to 
France, which are well known to the House." 

1 The despatch of the 'Panther was announced to the various 
Governments on July i. Its arrival at Agadir was reported on July 3. 

2 Replying to Mr. Balfour. 

123 



124 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Thus from the very outset the attitude of the Foreigrr 
Office may fairly be described as (i) an unreserved declara- 
tion in favour of the French case by accentuating the 
creation of a ** new situation " through Germany's action, 
vi^hereas the French occupation of Fez, precedently 
endorsed and applauded by Sir Edward Grey^ (plus the 
long-drawn-out and abortive negotiations described in the 
last chapter) as the factor in bringing about the *' new 
situation " was ignored. (2) An intimation that the 
British Government would insist upon taking part in the 
ensuing negotiations — an intimation which was inort-n4,^' 
because in point of fact, as explained in the last chapter,, 
negotiations had been going on for a considerable time, 
and the despatch of the Panther to Agadir had resulted at: 
once from the impossible jposition in which the German 
Government found itself of bringing them to a head, and' 
from the march on Fez while they were actually in progress 
and within a year of France's categorical pledge of firm 
attachment to the independence and integrity of Morocco. 

In short, at the very outset, the British Foreign Office 
went out of its way to make this Franco-German dispute 
its own, adopted a distinctly though not then pronounced 
anti-German tone, tinged with suspicion, and was, at 
least, the reverse of dispassionate. There was no sugges- 
tion of a wish to keep the scales balancing even for a time, 
while the French Foreign Minister was paying his official 
visit to the Dutch Court; but, on the contrary, the indica- 
tion of a somewhat precipitate desire to weigh them down 
in a certain direction. 

To inquire whether this was wise would be superfluous. 
It was merely illustrative and symptomatic of British 
foreign policy on the Morocco question since the Con- 
ference at Algeciras. Let us digress for a moment and 
glance backwards, though at the risk of repetition. Three 
things must be obvious, I venture to think, to those who 
have followed the narrative thus far. First, that official- 
France was determined — quite rightly, from the point of 



1 On November 27, 191 1, Sir Edward Grey was asked if he would 
give the House the information upon the strength of which he had 
approved the Fez expedition. He declined to do so. 

2 The British Government never participated in the ensuing nego- 
tiations, but the French Government kept the Foreign Office fully 
informed throughout, as stated by Sir Edward Grey in the House later 
on, an admission damaging to British foreign policy, as will appear in 
due course. 



A BRITISH DIPLOMATIC OPPORTaNITY 125 

view of those of her rulers who believed that her interests 
demanded it — to convert Morocco into a French Pro- 
tectorate. Secondly, that France relied upon British sup- 
port to achieve her ambition. Thirdly, that in French 
ofBcial circles opinion was divided as to the advisability 
of executingf the design (a) by relying solely upon British 
support with Russia in the iDackground, and thus again 
risking a rupture with Germany, (b) by securing German 
acquiescence for a consideration, as British, Spanish, and 
Italian acquiescence had been secured by the diplomatic 
arrangements concluded prior to the Conference of 
Algeciras. 

Such being the case, a really far-sighted British policy, 
really pursuing its oft-advertised concern for good relations 
between France and Germany, and its frequent repudiation 
of the slightest wish to cause friction between its friends 
and their neighbours, but surely, a line of action clearly 
mapped out before it. Upon its support of the French 
aim, linaccomplishable without that support, it cpuld have 
put a price. That price would have been an arrangement 
between France and Germany. That price would have 
been an insistence — justified to the hilt by Britain's 
signature at the foot of the Act of Algeciras — that the 
British Government could not, in honour, treat as non- 
existent Article 123 of that Act^; that the Act, assented to 
and signed by France, had materially modified precedent 
engagements and that British diplomatic support of French 
unavowed — indeed, repeatedly disclaimed — but neverthe- 
less, existing ambition, must be subject to a treatment of 
Germany commensurable with Germany's legal position, 
and with Germany's unquestionable rights. Such a policy 
was, I repeat, plainly designated from the point of view of 
British interests, British good faith, and that widest of all 
interests — solicitude for the peace of the world. Such a 
policy would also have been in the manifest interest of 
France herself. The men who bullied' and harassed 
successive French Governments into comminatory 
measures in Morocco, who transformed '* pacific penetra- 
tion " into financial strangulation, violent reprisals, 
incessant intrigues and sometimes cruel outrages, were 



1 Postulating {Vide Chapters VI. and VIII.) that the stipulations of 
the Act should prevail over any provisions in antecedent arrangements 
between the signatory Powers and Morocco, conflicting with these 
stipulations. 



126 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

the men who for the past twenty-five years had brought 
France to the verge of war with England on three 
occasions^; and who, between them, had cost the French 
tax-payer millions in armaments. 

Whether such a policy ever entered Sir Edward Grey's 
mind I do not know. Suffice it to say that it was not 
followed : that the party in France, and a strong party it 
was, not confined to one section of public opinion, which 
favoured a complete break with the Delcasse tradition, 
received no support from the British diplomatic machine. 
The party of the strong hand, the party of violence, the 
party which wrecked the negotiations of 1909-1911, the 
party which drove the Algerian frontier far into the Sultan's 
dominions, hypocritically declaring its attachment to 
Moroccan integrity, while it filched town after town, 
district after district, and having by the proceedings of 
its agents produced a state of chaos and disruption from 
one end of the country to the other, marched to Fez over 
the scattered remnants of the Public Law of Europe, 
thereby rendering a collision with Germany unavoidable — 
that party it was which, from first to last, received the 
support of the British diplomatic machine and the plaudits 
of its mouthpieces in the British Press.^ 

Public opinion in France was not more excited than 
M. de Selves. On July 5, M. Poincare — now Prime 

ISiam, West Africa, and over the Nile Valley (Fashoda). 

2 One might add, the Party which has filled North Africa from 
Udja to Sfax, with the pestilence of administrative and financial 
scandals ; which has determined the policy that has driven thousands 
of Algerian families to migrate to Syria, and which, if its activities be 
not curtailed, will bring about, before many years are over an uprising 
against French rule, extending from the North Atlantic to the borders 
of Tripoli ; the party whose machinations led to the enforcement of the 
Leopoldian system in the French Congo, and strewed bloodshed and 
devastation in its tracks — a hideous story studiously suppressed from 
the British public, but upon which several well-known Frenchmen 
have shed a sombre light. For a summarised version of one of 
the blackest pages of African history, vide Contemporary Review, 
December, 191 1. 

I commend Felicien Challaye's article in La Revue du Mois, for 
January, 1912. Here is a striking extract, and it is the hare, unvar- 
nished, incontestable truth : *' Honesty would in Morocco and the 
Congo have been the best of politics. France committed lamentable 
errors when, for the satisfaction of private interests, she violated in 
Morocco the Act of Algeciras, and in the Congo the Act of Berlin. . . 
Under what influences have been committed these violations of the Act 
of Algeciras? Incontestably through the influence of private 
interests." The whole article is an admirable piece of cool, honest, 
and informed writing by an expert on Colonial questions. 



FRENCH CALMNESS 127 

Minister — delivered a speech before the Democratic 
Republican Alliance, collected and moderate in tone — 

" It may be," he said, ** that we are paying the penalty 
of indecision and, in some respects, of our past mistakes. 
Let us leave all this on one side. It is futile to recriminate. 
We must not look behind us, we must look ahead with firm- 
joess and tranquility. Let our policy be frank, straight- 
forward, and resolute. Let us found it firmly upon our 
treaties with other nations ; let us, if necessary, lend our- 
selves to courteous negotiations, and we shall soon see the 
clouds disperse that have just rolled upon the horizon." 

What of the French Press? A section of it certainly 
expressed itself strongly, in terms, however, rather of 
indignant surprise than denunciation. ^ Even if the com- 
ments of this section of the Press had been stronger than 
they were it would not have been surprising — the French 
were the directly interested parties : moreover, three or four 
-of the numerous Parisian newspapers are always strongly 
anti-German, such as the Echo de Paris and the Eclair. , 
But another section, the more important f:nd better- 
informed section, took the " Crisis " in a very matter-of- 
fact way — notably Le Temps, which had been cognisant of I 
and (for private reasons of its own) had endorsed, the 
attempt on the French side to bring the negotiations of | 
1909-1911 to a satisfactory termination. The speech of i' 
that very able deputy, M. Marcel Sembat, in the Chamber 
last December, reveals so accurately the general feeling 
which prevailed in France at the time that one is dis- 
pensed from further illustration. After declaring — what 
has since become well known, but was not so widely 
^understood in December — that Germany's claims for com- 
pensation in the French Congo in exchange for her recog- 
nition of a French Protectorate over Morocco had arisen 
"*' in part from French suggestions, "^ he went on to say — 

ILET IT BE AGAIN REPEATED THAT THE FRANCO- 
SPANISH SECRET CONVENTION, AND THE SECRET 
ARTICLES OF THE ANGLO-FRENCH DECLARATION, WERE 
NOT PUBLICLY KNOWN, NOR WAS THE FULL STORY OF 
THE ABORTIVE 1909-1911 NEGOTIATIONS. 

2/.e. the Francb-German combination in the French Congo and 
Cameroons, signed by the Briand Cabinet, and upset by the Monis 
Cabinet — vide preceding chapter. No doubt M. Sembat also referred 
to the negotiations of the then French Premier, M. Caillaux, with the 
'German Government. 

[9] 



128 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

** One has to admit the despatch of the German boat to 
Agadir was regarded by a large part of the French Press, 
as expressing, not any hostile feeling or desire, but a wish 
to talk matters over. It was also described as the ' ringing 
of a bell.' . . . On the morrow of Agadir one had the 
impression (I had it not only in following the affair and the 
newspaper comments day by day, but also yesterday, when 
I reread those newspapers in the Library) that what was 
intended (i.e. by the despatch of the Panther) was to quiet 
down the French public, which was not a bad thing : and, 
moreover, to quiet it by saying: * Don't you understand? 
This is all in order that the discussions on the consortium 
be renewed. Don't imagine anything else: don't get 
alarmed : that is simply a business matter.' "^ 

In other words, public opinion in France — the country 
directly affected by Germany's action — was by no means 
convulsed. Quite the contrary. A great many persons 
in political, journalistic, and financial circles, . in the 
Parisian Salons (which make public opinion in France) 
were perfectly well aware that Germany, through a whole 
series of inter-related circumstances covering a protracted 
period, had a case, and a very strong case indeed. The 
repeated warnings conveyed to the French ambassador at 
Berlin by the German Government that if France stayed in 
Fez Germany would resume her complete freedom of action 
in Morocco, 2 Germany's unconcealed displeasure at the 
action of the Monis Ministry in rejecting the French- 
Congo Agreement signed by the Briand Ministry^ — these 
things had been known and openly discussed in the Salons 
for some time. That Germany would take some sort of 
action was, it is now quite clear, fully anticipated in well- 
informed quarters in Paris. And when she did, Paris, that 
most sensitive of cities, did not go into hysterics. 

^Journal Officiel, December i6, 191 1. 

2 Vide the cross-examination of M. Cruppi (Foreign Minister in the 
Monis Cabinet) by the Senatorial Commission on December 26. I 
refer to this later. 

3 When the Monis Cabinet came in (March, 191 1) the French- 
Foreign Office staff handed M. Cruppi, then Foreign Minister, a 
detailed report on the subject, pointing out that the German legation m 
Paris had ** manifested on several occasions the importance attached by 
the Imperial Government to the settlement of the negotiations," and 
warning the new occupant of the Department that a '* regrettable 
demonstration " was to be feared if they broke down, etc. Vide 
M. Jules Roche (Deputy) in La Republique jrangaise, *' Le Secret 
d 'Agadir," January 12, 1912. 



PULLING STRINGS 129 

In England, the Times echoed from the first the note 
of hostility observable in the attitude of the Foreign 
Office. If I quote the Times, it is for three reasons, and 
for no other. First, because its admirable service of 
foreign telegrams makes of it, deservedly, the inspirer of 
a considerable section of British newspapers, consequently 
of a considerable section of the British public ; while h 
exercises a quite special influence over one of the two great 
political parties in . the State. Secondly, because it is 
widely believed to have close relations with the Foreign 
Office and the British diplomatic machine generally, 
especially noticeable during the past eight years, and in 
Continental eyes is almost universally held to be the 
exponent of the views of those who direct British foreign 
policy. Thirdly, because the Times has played, ever since 
1905, a part in influencing British opinion over this 
Morocco affair which, whether it be regarded as sound and 
wise, or as unsound and mischievous, has been so conspicu- 
ous that to ignore that part would be impossible. The rSle 
of the Times must appear, indeed, to any student of the sub- 
ject an integral factor in the diplomatic history of Morocco 
since 1905. It should also be stated that a careful study 
of the despatches of the Tim.es correspondent at Tangier 
shows, on the whole, a remarkable desire to be impartial, 
and that the Tim.es, especially of late, has displayed its 
usual impartiality as a news-recorder by printing several 
despatches from its correspondent commenting severely 
upon French action in the matter of land-grabbing. \ 

The hostile note was sounded very early in the day» 
and continued up to Mr. Asquith's speech in the House 
on July 2y, when the editorial tone, at least, underwent 
considerable modification, maintained for a time, but, after- 
wards, again departed from. Thus on July 5 the Pari'^ j 
despatch of that date shows knowledge that the British 1 
Government had — | 

" explicitly intimated its desire to take part in the dis- 
cussion of a matter which very directly concerns important 
British interests of'various kinds. Certain French journals 
are therefore mistaken when they lay stress upon the 
probability of a tite-a-tSte between France and Germany on 
the subject of the Agadir incident." 

That, of course, was what the British Embassy in j 
Paris was aiming for — that there should be no Franco- [ 
German tete-a-tite — which both the German and the' 



130 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

French Governments, on the contrary, desired ; the German 
for the obvious reasons that it considered itself quite as 
much entitled to negotiate direct with France over a 
question in which ** important German interests " were 
at stake, as the British Government had considered itself 
so entitled in 1904 ; that it had already negotiated a Treaty 
direct with France in 1909, and that it had been engaged 
for the past eighteen months in direct negotiations with 
France; the French Government because — to put the 
matter bluntly — many of its members were desirous of 
wiping the slate clean with Germany, and were doubtful 
whether they would succeed in doing so if the British 
Government stepped in.^ 

From Berlin the same day the identical string was 
pulled — 

'* One thing " — says the Berlin despatch — " however, 
is certain — that in any conversations that take place 
England will have to take part." 

And this from the editorial of the 6th — the same issue, 
i.e. in which the above despatches appeared — 

"It is not our habit to draw back from our pledged 
word, or to suffer other Powers to settle important interests 
of ours in * conversations ' held behind our backs. . . No 
I * claims ' can be admitted and no * compensations ' allowed 
in an international matter which concerns us nearly and 
deeply, without our participation and assent." 

Pretty good that — in view of the circumstance that the 
British diplomatic machine had settled the " Morocco 
question (as it thought) behind the back " of Germany by 
secret treaties concealed from the world, in 1904 ! And 
note the arrogance of the second quoted sentence. If 
Englishmen would put themselves in the shoes of Germans 
sometimes, I wonder how they would appreciate this sort 
of thing. xA.s a revelation of the working of the diplomatic 
machine these three extracts are quite interesting. 

M. de Selves returned to Paris on the 7th ; saw M. 
Cambon, French ambassador at Berlin (then in Paris con- 
ferring with M. Caillaux, the Prime Minister), the same 
day. M. Cambon left Paris for Berlin that night. 

IThis explains in part the violent onslaught upon M. Caillaux in 
certain British newspapers. See concluding chapter. 



CHAPTER XX. 

FURTHER LIGHT UPON THE BRITISH OFFICIAL ATTITUDE FROM 
JULY I TO JULY 12. 

Thus closed the first week of July. M. Cambon and che 
German Foreign Minister began their protracted bargain- 
ing bout on the 9th. On that interview and the succeeding 
ones the basis of negotiations which lasted some four 
months and went through many vicissitudes was deter- 
mined by mutual consent.^ 

The basis was that Germany and France would 
negotiate direct without the intervention of third parties 
as they had done in February, 1909, and as France had 
negotiated in 1904 direct with Britain and then with Spain : 
that Germany would recognise an unqualified French Pro- 
tectorate over Morocco subject to (a) binding guarantees as 
to the permanence of the open door for trade^ coupled with 
securities for open tenders in the construction of public 
works, ^ (h) territorial compensation in the French Congo 
with reciprocal exchange of German West African 
territory. 

By July 15, the general lines the discussion was taking 
became publicly known, and the information was, on the 
whole, calmly received in the Paris Press. 

Let us pass at once to the further and disastrous 
development in the anti-German attitude of our Foreign 
Office. Sir Edward Grey's opportunities at this moment 

1 There are, indeed, very strong presumptions for assuming that the 
ground had been prepared before the official negotiations began, per- 
haps as far back as June, when it was known in French Government 
and diplomatic circles, that Germany contemplated action of some 
sort, and M. Cambon had been sent (on June 20) to Kissingen to see 
the German Foreign Minister : and during the three days' absence of 
M. de Selves in Holland, when the Premier, M. Caillaux, took the 
conduct of foreign affairs under his charge. See in this connection 
also M. de Selves' speech in the Chamber (vide Chapter XXII.). But 
the fact is not yet absolutely established from amid the clamours of 
personal affirmations and denials let loose by the investigations of the 
French Senatorial Committee. In any case it is a matter which chiefly 
concerns the French — not the national interests of Great Britain, 

2 Stipulated for thirty years only by the British Government in the 
Anglo-French Declaration of 1904 {vide Chapter XXIV. 

3 Not stipulated at all in Anglo-French Declaration. 

131 



132 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

were immense. It depended upon him to make Great 
Britain's rdle in the matter an influence for harmony or 
discord. The Journal des Dehats expressed the situation 
in a nutshell when it said^ : ** The turn which the conversa- 
tions will take between Paris and Berlin must inevitably 
depend upon the attitude of England." Spanish opinion 
was similarly reflected in the Imparcial, and from Madrid 
the Times correspondent reported : ** It is generally agreed 
that the main interest . . . centres in the attitude of 
England." What could a mind, free from prejudice, 
sweeping in broad survey over the position with its long 
chain of antecedent links, not have accomplished at this 
juncture ? 

But Sir Edward Grey had started badly, had already 
committed himself to a position he was unable from the 
first to sustain, that of insistence upon becoming an oflficial 
party to the Franco-German discussions. He was full of 
suspicion, and, obviously, ill-informed.^ 

An examination of his speech in the House on 
November 2y shows how vain was the hope that he could 
shake himself free from the anti-German atmosphere in 
which the Foreign Office and the British embassy in Paris 
were saturated. The German ambassador had accom- 
panied the formal notification^ of the despatch of the 
Panther to Agadir by a verbal explanation,* the substance 
of which was that a situation had gradually arisen " which 
rendered the provisions of the Algeciras Act illusory," that 
while the German Government '* had in no event the 
intention of making any reproach to France on account of 
her action " — 

** In view of the state of affairs it might appear 
questionable whether it would be possible for France to 
return to the status quo ante, e.g., the status quo of 1906. 
We were, therefore, prepared, if it became necessary, to 
seek, in conjunction with France, some means, which 
would be compatible with the interests of the other signa- 
tory Powers, of arriving at a definite understanding on the 
Morocco question. Direct negotiations could hardly 

ijuly 5- 

2 At no time, for example, did he give the slightest indication that 
he possessed any knowledge of the protracted 1909-1911 negotiations 
(vide Chapter XVIII.). 

3 Vide Chapter XVIII. 

* British White Book Cd. 5992. 



GERMAN EXPLANAT10x\S r ^:, 

meet with insuperable difficulties in view of the good 
•relations existing between us and France." 

This explanation. Sir Edward Grey has told us, seemed 
1o him '* much more important than the actual communi- 
cation of the sending of the ship " — ' 

**The explanation g-iven to us made it clear that the 
Moroccan question was being- opened — the whole Moroccan 
question — by the sending of the ship to Agadir. They 
made it clear that the German Government regarded a 
return to the status quo in Morocco as doubtful, if not 
impossible, and that what they contemplated was a definite 
solution of the Moroccan question between Germany, 
France, and Spain. The whole question, or at least the 
"kernel of the question, after that communication was 
received, was what was the definite solution of the 
Moroccan question. What was the nature of that? What 
was clearly the objective Germany contemplated? Was it 
to be the partition of Morocco, or what was it to be? That 
-was what occupied our minds after receiving that com- 
munication. " 

With what the reader has gathered from the precedent 
analysis' of the facts as given in this volume, the obvious 
comments upon that statement at once suggest themselves. 
What was there of surprise or menace in the German view 
that a return to the status quo of 1906 was doubtful if not 
impossible? Was it not a self-evident fact? How could 
'Sir Edward Grey affect to consider a return to the status 
quo in Morocco — the status quo embodied in the Public 
"Law of Europe framed at Algeciras — possible with the 
French in occupation of Fez, Rabat, Mequinez, Casa- 
"blanca, Udja, and the whole of the Shawiya, with Spain in 
'Occupation of Larash and El-Kasr, with nigh upon 100,000 
French and Spanish troops spread over Morocco? What 
authority had the Act of Algeciras given for this 
situation? Did any fraction of the status quo remain? 
And then, why did Sir Edward Grey jump to the conclusion 
that Germany contemplated a partition of Morocco with 
France and Spain? No allusion whatever to Spain had 
been made in the German ambassador's communication. 
What grounds had Sir Edward Grey for supposing that 
Germany aimed at a partition of Morocco at all? No 
action of Germany's from 1880 onwards had given rise to 
tthat supposition. The official repudiation of successive Ger- 



134 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

man Governments that they entertained any such idea had 
been observed in the letter for a period of thirty years, and 
this in the face of incessant attacks from quarters in Ger- 
many desirous that she should effect a political footing in 
Morocco, which — in point of fact — she was just as much, 
or as little, entitled to do as either France, Spain, or 
Britain. In February, 1909, the German Government had 
corroborated all its previous declarations — declarations 
supported by acts — in that respect, by its Treaty with 
France. France it was, and Spain, which with the concur- 
rence of Sir Edward Grey's predecessor had, in secret 
" partitioned " Morocco seven years before, and were then 
actively engaged in carrying out that British-approved 
programme, despite the Algeciras Act, signed by Great 
Britain, proclaiming the independence and integrity of 
Morocco ! 

Moreover, if Sir Edward Grey really believed that 
Germany harboured these designs, surely there was an 
obvious way of satisfying himself as to the foundation of 
his belief? The German ambassador had told him on the 
4th that in his (the German ambassador's) view "the 
Imperial Government had absolutely no wish to exclude 
England from the new arrangement of things, or to prevent 
any possible safeguarding of British interests in 
Morocco."^ If Sir Edward Grey judged the German- 
notification and the German ambassador's assertion 
insufficient, why did he not request more definite explana- 
tions? He made no such request,, either to the German 
ambassador or through the British ambassador at Berlin, 

Why? Why did he hug these suspicions and make na 
attempt to clarify the situation? Between the 4th, when' 
he had summoned the German ambassador and told him 
that the despatch of the Panther had created a new^ 
situation and that Great Britain must be a party to the 
negotiations which ensued, and the 12th, Sir Edward Grey- 
took no steps whatsoever in this direction. 

What happened on the 12th? Sir Edward Grey has 
told us. The British ambassador at Berlin **had occasion 
to see the German Foreign Secretary on some minor 
matters. "^ He " took the opportunity to say that there 
had been at one time some mention of a conversation 
a trois between Germany, France, and Spain, the inference 

1 British White Book Cd. 5994. 

2 Sir E. Grey in the House of Commons, November 27, 19*1.. 



A DISCREDITABLE MANOEUVRE 135 

being that we were to be excluded from it. "^ What did 
the German Foreign Secretary reply? In Sir Edward 
Grey's words he " told our ambassador to inform us that 
there never had been such an idea/*^ The German version 
is — 

"Once only, on the 12th July, did the English 
ambassador here speak to the Secretary of State of the 
possibility of a negotiation a trois in regard to Morocco- 
between Germany, France, and Spain, and added the 
remark that this would make an unfavourable impression 
in England. The ambassador received a reply on the same 
day, as an official statement of the German Government 
that such an intention had never existed."^ 

Thus, by July 12, Sir Edward Grey had received, in 
addition to- the statement in the notification, the personal 
assurance of the German ambassador in London and the^ 
official assurance of the German Government that Germany 
did not contemplate, and never had contemplated, a 
negotiation for the partition of Morocco with France and' 
Spain. 

By that time, too, he had had similar assurances from 
France,^ unless his statement to the House on November 
2^/ that the French Government had consulted him "at 
every point where it seemed at all likely that British 
interests might be affected — most loyally at every point, "^' 
was devoid of meaning. It is most important that that 
statement should be borne in mind, confirmed as it is by 
similar statements made later by the French Foreign 
Minister.^ For the negotiations between M. Cambon and 
the German Foreign Secretary had already, as we have- 
recorded, begun, and we shall see in a moment that the 
position taken by the German Government at the outset 
was such as described at the opening of this chapter. 

It would seem necessary at this point to refer to a 
matter which is within the personal cognisance of a number 
of persons, the writer included. When Mr. Lloyd George's 
speech — to which I am coming in a moment — was- 
delivered, it caused the utmost surprise (except in one 
quarter) not only in Germany, but in England : not only ta 

ISir E. Grey in the House of Commons, November 27, 191 1. 

2/&. 

3 British White Book Cd. 5994. 

* Vide Chapter XXII. 

5 Sir E. Grey in the House of Commons, November 27, 1911 

« Vide Chapter XXII. 



136 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

the general public in England but among the supporters of 
the Government and even among the members of the 
Cabinet itself.^ Many well-known members of Parliament, 
publicists, and others made inquiry as to what might lie 
behind so direct, and at the same time so unusual a method 
of communicating a warning — almost a menace — to a 
foreign Government. These inquirers were informed, I 
will not say by whom, but at any rate they were informed, 
and they were informed under conditions permitting them 
to pass on the information to others, that the speech was 
intended as a protest against the discourtesy of the German 
Government in keeping a British despatch unreplied to for 
a fortnight. And that story — that discreditable and utterly 
untrue story — was permitted to go the round of the clubs 
and editorial sanctums. When the diplomatic machine is 
seen to be capable of such performances, most men will 
agree that it is badly in need of repair. 

It is also advisable before proceeding with the general 
narrative to draw attention to the misleading impression 
left upon the public mind by Sir Edward Grey's reference 
(in the speech defending his policy in the House on 
November 27) to the German view of the French occupa- 
tion of Fez. He said — 

**The German Chancellor and the German Foreign 
Secretary have already disposed of one misapprehension 
with regard to the Moroccan question. It was imagined in 
some quarters, I think I have seen it on the paper of this 
House in a question put, that Germany had protested 
-against the French action in going to Fez at all, and that 
France had persisted in going there in the face of the 
German protest. The German Government have now 
-explained what the German view was of what the French 
-going to Fez really was, and I have no comment or 
criticism to make upon what they said." 

This utterance, made at the opening of the *' narrative " 
part of Sir Edward Grey's speech, has naturally strength- 
ened the public view, for the most part ignorant of the data 
set forth in this book, at any rate in their cumulative 
significance, that the despatch of the Panther to Agadir 
was remote from the Fez expedition, and was merely an 
afterthought with sinister intent. Now, what had the 
"German Chancellor and Foreign Secretary admitted in the 

1 Only Sir Edward Grey and the Prime Minister were aware of 
what Mr. Lloyd George was going to say 



GERMANY^S WARNINGS 137 

public statement to which Sir Edward Grey had alluded? 
They had admitted that Germany had not objected to 
France going- to Fez with the proclaimed French object of 
withdrawing to the coast the Europeans alleged to be in 
jeopardy. But the German Chancellor had stated — 

** We added the explicit reservation, however, which 
we also announced publicly, that we retained our liberty of 
action should the French expedition go beyond its alleged 
object, even should such action be merely the result of 
circumstances arising out of the expedition."^ 

How faithfully the German Government dealt with 
France on the point the French Senatorial Committee's 
investigations reveal. 

** During to-day's (19th of December) cross examina- 
tion of M. de Selves" — runs the authorised account of 
these proceedings^ — ** it was ascertained that in pre- 
liminary conversations between the German Foreign 
Secretary and the French ambassador in Berlin with regard 
to the French occupation, first of Rabat and then of Fez, 
Herr von Kiderlen Waechter made repeated and definite 
reservations as to the eventual attitude of Germany in case 
the occupation were prolonged. As regards the French 
march to Fez, Herr von Kiderlen Waechter had from the 
outset insisted that this step would become inevitable after 
the advance to Rabat. To this suggestion M. Cambon at 
first demurred, but in the face of subsequent events, he was 
compelled to admit its accuracy. Herr von Kiderlen 
Waechter then urged that if the French went to Fez they 
would remain there. M. Cambon again demurred, but 
Herr von Kiderlen Waechter replied that an evacuation in 
the circumstances would be unprecedented. M. Cambon 
ultimately admitted the possibility of the occupation of 
Fez, whereupon Herr von Kiderlen Waechter replied that 
in that case Germany would resume complete liberty of 
action as regards Morocco. ' ' 

Therefore, if France had not gone to Fez " in the face 
of the German protest ' ' — a * * protest ' ' under such circum- 
stances involving an ultimatum, i.e. war — she had gone to 
Fez, and stayed in Fez, in the teeth of an explicit German 
warning that the German Government would regard her 

1 British White Book Cd. 5970. , 

2 In all the Paris and many British newspapers of December 27. 



138 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

action as the culminating episode in her destruction of the 
Public Law of Europe embodied in the Algeciras Act, and 
would, thenceforth, resume the entire liberty of action it 
possessed before Germany had co-operated with the other 
Powers in framing that Public Law. Presumably Sir 
Edward Grey had full cognisance of that German warning 
at the time — unless, indeed, those desirous of influencing 
him in an anti-German direction had concealed it from him, 
which is possible. In any case, Sir Edward Grey, as the 
head of the British diplomatic machine, must bear the 
responsibility for the policy which, taking no account of 
this warning, endorsed French action to the uttermost, 
with all the consequences which were bound to flow from 
it as touching the future of British relations with Germany. 
When the inevitable happened Sir Edward Grey professed 
to be greatly astonished, perturbed, and not a little 
indignant. The amazing thing is how British diplomacy 
could for a moment have imagined that it was not bound to» 
happen. 



MAP III. 



ENGLISH MILES 



too too 



FRENCH 
KTEST AFRICA 



i'ANGLO -EGYPTIAN 
SUDAN 




Stan/brdi 'GeoffPEstabP,loruion,. 



Lp of part of West-Central Africa showing the area affected by the Franco- 
jrman negotiations of June-Nov., 191 1 ; and the neighbouring dependencies. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THE STORY OF AN ANNOUNCEMENT, AN INTERVIEW, 
AND A SPEECH. 

From July 12 to July 19 the (discussions in Berlin and Paris 
went on, in silence so far as the outward world was con- 
cerned, Sir Edward Grey, as he has himself told us, being 
kept informed throughout, presumably both by the French 
ambassador and by the British embassy in Paris. A' sort of 
expectant calm reigned. It was destined to be rudely 
disturbed on the 20th. 

On that day Morocco passed into the background for 
the time being, and the French Congo took its place — that 
portion of the French dependencies in tropical Africa 
where, by mutual consenjt and by protracted antecedent 
negotiations, Germany was to find compensation for the 
final forced abandonment of her stand on behalf of 
Moroccan integrity and for her acquiescence in the final 
consummation of the French designs ; even as Britain had 
found compensation by the surrender of the French 
position in Egypt, Italy a free hand to make good her aims 
in Tripoli, Spain in Morocco itself. 

On July 20 the Times published a despatch of over a 
column in length from Paris, entitled *' German Policy and 
British Interests " (not French, be it noted !). The 
despatch opened with a quotation from Mr. Asquith*s 
statement on July 6,^ in which the latter had spoken of 
"British interests " being possibly affected, and went on 
to say that ** developments affecting British interests are 
already in progress." Mr. Asquith had, of course, meant 
British interests in Morocco; but here, it seemed, was a 
question of British interests elsewhere also. The despatch 
continued that Germany was pressing proposals which, 
" as German statesmen must be well aware, could not for 
one moment be entertained by any conceivable French 
Government." Those proposals had nothing to do with 
Morocco, it appeared, but with French Congo, where Ger- 

IVide Chapter XIX. 
139 



I40 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

many was "demanding impossible * compensations.' ** 
The barg-ain was ** so monstrously unfair" that its 
proposers could not ** seriously have believed that it would 
be entertained in Paris." What Germany was really after, 
we were told, was the acquisition of the Agadir hinterland, 
which, "by directly compromising British interests," 
would put " a, perhaps, fatal strain upon the Anglo-French 
entente." The wiles of the German Government might be 
deadlier still, for had not the Frankfurter Zeitung^ been 
making suggestions which — 

"amount to nothing less than a general reconciliation of 
France and Germany on the basis of the unreserved open- 
ing of the French money market for the benefit of the 
-German national credit and German industrial enterprises 
at home and abroad. ... It has now been universally 
recognised that the political consequences of a settlement 
on this scale would be too far-reaching, and that, quite 
apart from the question of Anglo-French relations, it would 
mean the death-blow to the Russian Alliance." 

" It would be regarded," concluded this part of the 
contribution, " as entirely in keeping with Mr. Asquith's 
statement on July 6, if Great Britain should decide to see 
for herself what the Germans are doing at Agadir." In 
other words, send a warship there, as the Times had 
recommended in a leading article on the 20th. ^ This 
message, in which the finger of the British diplomatic 
machine — abroad ! — is as clearly indicated as the clock on 
the face of St. Stephen's (note in particular the insinuation 
that a " reconciliation of Franco-German relations would 
be a catastrophe for Britain's relations with France), was 
introduced by an Editorialette headed "The Moroccan 
Crisis. German demands in West Africa. Strong feeling 
in France," which went one better than the Paris despatch 

1 One of the most independent papers in Germany, by the way, 
and often a ruthless critic both of the Emperor and of the Govern- 
ment. 

2 By a coincidence — shall we say ? — that suggestion had already 
■ come before the British Cabinet and was rejected, the majority of the 

Cabinet doubtless being of the opinion that the British Empire was, 
after all, not imperilled by the presence on the God-forsaken coast of 
South Atlantic Morocco, at a spot five hundred miles distant from 
Gibraltar, of a German gunboat with an equipment of one hundred 
and twenty-five men. The French Cabinet was divided on the oppor- 
tuneness of the step. Note that the Daily Mail had announced the 
^probability of the despatch of a British and French cruiser on the 4th. 



(rERMAN DEMANDS 141 

hy holding that Germany had also demanded ** the con- 
tingent reversion held by France over the Congo State." 
Where, one wonders, did the Times get that from? There 
is no hint of it in the Paris despatch. ^ These ** compensa- 
tions " — concluded the editorial introduction — "would 
obviously touch Britain's interests in Africa in several very 
important directions. . . ." 

Denunciation was left to the editorial proper, which 
was of extreme violence. Headed **The German 
Demands," it opened thus — 

"The German demands are at last known. They are 
understood to be surrender by France to Germany of the 
whole of French Congo from the sea to the River Sanga, 
and also the renunciation in Germany's favour of the con- 
tingent claims of France to the acquisition of the Congo 
State should circumstances at any time lead to the aliena- 
tion of that vast and important territory by its present 
possessors. This is the ** compensation " which Germany 
demands for the aid which France has given to the Sultan 
of Morocco" at his express request for the maintenance of 
his sovereignty and the restoration of order and peace 
within a portion of his dominions." 

To the above may be added the following — 

" German statesmen, as our Paris Correspondent says, 

must know perfectly well that no French Government could 

for a moment entertain them. They must know equally 

well that no British Government could consent to suffer so 

IThe German Government issued a denial. No French Minister 
has asserted that Germany ever made such a demand. Sir Edward 
Grey said not a word about it in defending his attitude in the House 
on November 27. That the future of the Congo State (Belgian Congo) 
vsis repeatedly discussed, and that various suggestions were made on 
both sides we know. That the French Prime Minister himself made 
at one time a suggestion somewhat similar in character to the 
** demand " attributed to Germany I happen personally to be aware. 
The upshot of the discussion on this particular point may be seen in 
Article i6 of the Franco-German Convention of November 4, 191 1, 
which the effect is to substitute for a right of pre-emption of question- 
able legality, secretly obtained by France from King Leopold, in 1884, 
as her price for signing the Act of Berlin of 1885, the submission of any 
change in the status of the Congo to all the Powers signatory to the 
Berlin Act which created that State. Thus Germany is seen, so far as 
these negotiations are concerned, to have founded her attitude on the 
Congo State question upon the Public Law of Europe as she did her 
attitude on the Morocco question. Less subtle, no doubt, but more 
honest, it seems to me ! See in this connection Chapter XXIV. 
[lo] 



142 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

great a change to be made in the distribution of power in 
Africa, even were a French Government to be found feeble 
enough to sanction it.^ 

The editorial wound up by again expressing the hope 
that British ships might be sent to Agadir to ** hasten 
developments." 

To all outward seemmg, the heavy guns of Printing 
House Square shattered the nerves of Downing Street, for 
the next — i.e. July 21 — Sir Edward Grey sent for the 
German ambassador and told him that the silence of the 
British Government in the absence of any communication 
from the German Government since July 4^ must not be 
interpreted as a slackening of British interest in the matter. 
He had been ** made anxious by the news which appeared 
the day before as to the demands which the German 
Government had made on the French Government." The 
demands involved " a cession of the French Congo/' 
which it ** was obviously impossible for the French Govern- 
ment to concede." If the negotiations were unsuccessful 
** a very embarrassing situation would arise." According 
to ** native rumours " the Panther's people were *' landing 
and negotiating with the tribes." Agadir was a suitable 
place for ** a naval basis." It might be necessary to ** take 
some steps to protect British interests." In his speech in 
the House, Sir Edward Grey subsequently explained that — 

*' I was afraid, and I spoke to the German ambassador 
because I was afraid that things were developing in a way 
that would bring up the Morocco question, force the 
Moroccan negotiations back not upon an arrangement 
between France and Germany about the Congo and 
Morocco respectively, but upon something in the nature of 
the partition of Morocco or some sort of solution which 
might make the question of British interests to be directly 
aJEfected, and which would certainly bring into operation 
our treaty obligations with France." 

1 Italics mine. 

2 It is a little difficult to see what the German Government could 
have done further in the interval. The German ambassador had given 
his personal assurance on the 4th that Sir Edward Grey's suspicions 
were groundless ; the German Government had categorically given a 
similar assurance to the British ambassador at Berlin on the 12th. 
Sir Edward Grey had not made any request for further information, 
and the French Government at no time intimated a desire that the 
British Government should become an official party to the negotiations 



ENTER MR. LLOYD GEORGE 143 

The version of this conversation given by Sir Edward 
Grey to the House — the only British version extant— r-was 
obviously much abridged. The German official version 
is fuller, and it appears therefrom that Sir Edward Grey 
suggested the advisability of an exchange of views before 
events developed further. As the German official version 
has been issued as a White Book by the British Foreign 
Office it may be assumed that the above statement is an 
accurate representation of Sir Edward Grey's words. After 
registering a sort of general protest against Sir Edward 
Grey's assumption that Germany had made impossible 
demands upon France, repeating that Germany had not the 
slightest intention of injuring British interests, pointing 
out that no third Power was bound by the Anglo-French 
Declaration of 1904, and that Germany for her part was 
only bound by the Algeciras Act and her treaty with France 
of February, 1909, both of which were based upon the 
independence and integrity of Morocco ; that no one could 
pretend that the independence and integrity of Morocco had 
not been violated ; that although Germany made no com- 
plaint against France on that score '* she must offer some 
compensation approximately equivalent to the great goal 
she had in view " — even as England had secured in Egypt ; 
and that he ** could not conceal from the Minister (Sir 
Edward Grey) that he seemed to be applying two 
standards," one standard for France and another for 
Germany ; the German ambassador immediately com- 
municated the interview with Sir Edward Grey to his 
Government. The German Government replied at once : 
the reply was in London on July 23, and the German 
ambassador called at the Fereign Office on July 24. 

But, meantime, an event had happened which brought 
to its culminating point the anti-German attitude adopted 
by the Foreign Office from the outset. Without even 
waiting for a reply to this, his first communication with the 
German ambassador since the formal assurance received 
from the German Government that any thought of a 
partition of Morocco with France and Spain, from which 
Britain was to be excluded, was remote from that Govern- 
ment's mind. Sir Edward Grey communicated with the 
Prime Minister and with the Chancellor of the Exchequer.^ 
Tha-t very evening Mr. Lloyd George, speaking at a 
banquet given in his honour at the Mansion House, after a 
reference to the blessings of peace said — 

1 Though nt)t with the other members of the Cabinet. 



144 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

'* But I am also bound to say this — that I believe it 
is essential in the higfhest interests, not merely of this 
country but of the world, that Britain should at all hazards 
maintain her place and her prestige amongst the Great 
Powers of the world. Her potent influence has many a 
time been in the past, and may yet be in the future, invalu- 
able to the cause of human liberty. It has more than once 
in the past redeemed Continental nations, who are some- 
times too apt to forget that service, from overwhelming 
disaster and even from international extinction. I would 
make great sacrifices to preserve peace. I conceive that 
nothing would justify a disturbance of international good- 
will except questions of the gravest national moment. But 
if a situation were to be forced upon us in which peace could 
only be preserved by the surrender of the great and 
beneficent position Britain has won by centuries of heroism 
and achievement, by allowing Britain to be treated where 
her interests were vitally affected as if she were of no 
account in the Cabinet of Nations, then I say emphatically 
that peace at that price would be a humiliation intolerable 
for a great country like ours to endure. National honour 
is no party question. The security of our great inter- 
national trade is no party question ; the peace of the world 
is much more likely to be secured if all nations realise fairly 
what the conditions of peace must be. And it is because I 
have the conviction that nations are beginning to under- 
stand each other better, to appreciate one another's points 
of view more thoroughly, to be more ready to discuss 
calmly and dispassionately their differences, that I feel 
assured that nothing will happen between now and next 
year which will render it difficult for the Chancellor of the 
Exchequer in this place to respond to the toast proposed to 
you, my Lord Mayor, of the continued prosperity of the 
public peace." 

All momentary doubt as to the precise significance of 
the speech was set at rest the next morning by the Times, 
which printed it in two places in its issue (July 22) with 
suitable accentuating notes and head-lines, and accom- 
panied by an editorial entitled ** The European Crisis," 
which I think should be reproduced here in full — 

** Mr. Lloyd George's clear, decisive, and statesmanlike 
reference, at the Bankers' dinner last night, to the 
European situation created by the German demands in 
West Africa will be endorsed without distinction of party 
by all his countrymen. In making public the amazing 



HIS SPEECH INTERPRETED 145 

character of those demands on Thursday last we called 
attention to the extreme gravity of the claim which they 
imply. It is not merely that Germany, in advancing- them, 
demands concessions out of all proportion to the interests 
which she is able and prepared to cede, though that aspect 
in itself is serious enough. Far more serious, because the 
present demarche is only the last of several attempts of 
kindred nature, is the light which it throws upon the whole 
method and purpose of German statesmanship. Some 
indignation is expressed in the German Pres^ at the fact 
that Herr von Kiderlen Waechter's suggestions have been 
brought into the light and at the criticism which they have 
evoked. We cannot pretend to regret either the publicity 
or the criticism. Europe has nothing to lose by revela- 
tions which show the true pretensions of its greatest 
military Power, even though the diplomacy of that Power 
itself may prefer to move, as Dick Turpin preferred to 
move, in the dark. The purport of such demands as were 
outlined in Berlin last week is nothing less than a claim 
for absolute European predominance. Neither France nor 
Great Britain could have entertained them for a moment 
without confessing themselves overborne by German 
power. That is not the intention of our French neigh- 
bours, nor is it our own. Mr. Lloyd George made that 
perfectly clear last night. * If a situation were to be 
forced on us,' he said, * in which peace could only be pre- 
served by the surrender of the great and beneficent position 
Britain has won by centuries of heroism and achievement, 
by allowing Great Britain to be treated, where her interests 
were vitally aifected, as if she were of no account in the 
Cabinet of Nations, then I say emphatically that peace at 
that price would be a humiliation intolerable for a great 
country like ours to endure.* We have, insisted on the 
gravity of the position, because humiliation of that kind 
for the interested Powers was implicit in the German 
demands, but we have every confidence that, with the 
better understanding of British temper which Mr. Lloyd 
George's speech is calculated to produce, those demands 
will assume a more reasonable form. Mr. Lloyd George 
is under no suspicion of jingoism, and it may be taken 
that in what he said last night he spoke not only for him- 
self, but for the British Government. He spoke, indeed, 
for his countrymen as a whole. Even at such a moment of 
internal crisis as the present, party divisions can in no 
way affect the unity of English sentiment upon a question 



146 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

involving the honour as well as the interests of the country 
in the outside world. We ourselves know that that is so ; 
it is time it were realised abroad." 

For two or three days preceding the announcement in 
the Times one or two Paris newspapers had changed their 
previous tone for one of greater aggressiveness, and the 
chauvinist organs had become openly violent. Mr. Lloyd 
George's speech and the Times comment the next day, 
punctuating its significance, and comparing the German 
Government to Dick Turpin, added fuel to the flames. A 
furious Press campaign followed, not in France only, but 
in England as well, taken up in the weeklies and maga- 
zines. In France it subsided as soon as it arose — French 
diplomacy having secured its end. But it raged in Eng- 
land for three months, German resentment and bitterness 
growing as it progressed^ — not against France, but against 
Britain, and concentrating upon the obvious torch which 
set light to the edifice, viz., the attitude of the British 
Foreign Office as crystallised in the speech of the Chan- 
cellor of the Exchequer, who, of course, was merely used 
by Sir Edward Grey as the latter's mouthpiece. 

On the top of everything came the disclosures of 
Captain Faber, M.P., which could not be denied, because 
in their substance, though not in every detail, they were 
true, as everyone with relatives or friends in both Services 
knew. Confirmed by Mr. Arthur Ponsonby and Mr. Noel 
Buxton, later on by Lord Charles Beresford, Mr. Sidney 
Low, Admiral Fremantle, and others, the German public 
learned that last summer the British Government was pre- 
pared under certain contingencies to support the French 
case in Morocco — which legally was unsound, morally was 
doubtful, and was in its relation with Germany's, at the 
very least, no better — with the whole naval and military 
power of Britain. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

AN ANALYSIS OF THE EVENTS OF JULY 20 AND 21 IN THE 
LIGHT OF FACTS NOW ESTABLISHED. 

Was the Times announcement of July 20 designed to 
force Sir Edward Grey's hand by whatsoever influences 
suggested ; or was it inspired directly or indirectly by the 
Foreign Office in order to have its hand forced?^ Or was 
it solely and simply an expedient by French diplomacy, in 
order to create a diversion in England in France's favour, 
so that the compensation bill the French Government would 
have to pay should be as small as possible? Probably it 
may have been a mixture of the first and last hypotheses. 
Anyway the announcement succeeded in enormously 
embittering Anglo-German relations. 

Of Sir Edward Grey's action on July 21 — and the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer's speech must, of course, be 
regarded as part and parcel of it — it is difficult to judge 
otherwise than severely. Whether he was in receipt of 
news similar to that published in the Times, either from 
the French Government direct through its ambassador in 
London or through the British embassy in Paris — in which 
case the information given to him was inaccurate in its 
most essential aspects and incomplete in others ; or, as his 
conversation with the German ambassador and his speech 

1 In this connection the following despatch from Berlin in the 
Times of November 10 is interesting. It is part of a criticism of the 
German Chancellor '« remarks on the 9th : — 

" In view especially of what followed it must be observed that 
Herr von Bethmann Hollweg's version of events is remarkable for 
its omissions. The acuteness of the recent ' crisis ' was beyond all 
-question due in large measure to two things which are not here 
•mentioned — the manner in which Germany chose to conduct the con- 
versations with France, and the original presentation by Germany of 
'demands enormously in excess of the gains which ultimately satisfied 
lier. The demands were presented in the middle oi July and they 
were withdrawn at the beginning of August. Mr. Lloyd George's 
speech was delivered on the morrow of the publication of the demands. 
The speech would presumably not have been delivered if the demands 
had not been presented and pressed. There would presumably have 
been war if the demands had not been withdrawn."^ 

^Italics mine. 
't47 



148 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

in the House indicate, although it appears hardly credible^ 
his information was taken solely from the Times — is- 
immaterial. The fact remains that he adopted the Times' 
statement,^ the Times' views, and the Tim.es' tone. He 
spoke of German ** demands " — in the sense in which the 
ordinary man interpreted them in reading the Tim,es, i.e. as 
a species of ultimatum., Germany's last word, " I demand 
this or I shall go to war " attitude. He spoke of these 
demands as ** obviously impossible for the French Govern- 
ment to concede," not, it is true, going quite so far as the 
Tim,es, which had added, as we have seen, that no British. 
Government ought to permit them to be conceded even if a 
French Government were found weak enough to do so. On 
another point he had gone even further than the Tim.es, 
speaking of a cession of the "French Congo," although* 
even according to the Times map, the '* demands " only 
embraced about one-third of the French Congo. ^ He could 
not surely have been m,ore emphatic in defence of a purely 
French interest had he been the servant of the French 
Republic instead of a servant of the British Empire.^ He 
reverted again to the partition scheme he had previously 
attributed to Germany, thus plainly intimating that he did' 
not believe the formal repudiation of the German Govern- 
ment conveyed to him on the 12th. He had wound up^ by 
suggesting a formal exchange of views. Then, presum- 
ably as an encouragement thereto, without giving the 
German ambassador time to communicate with his Govern- 
ment,* he had promptly put up the Chancellor of the 
Exchequer to make a speech which, delivered under the 
circumstances of the moment, no proud nation in the world 
would have regarded otherwise than as a gratuitous inter- 
ference, as a menace — the more exasperating as the 
German Government knew itself to be grossly misrepre- 
sented, but could have proved it only by breaking off 
negotiations with France. 

Now what were the facts? First, as to the 
"demands." There do not appear to have been any- 
" demands " in the sense used by the Times, endorsed hy 

1 Except the statement regarding the Congo State. 

2 See Map. 

3 According to the uncontradicted German version. Vide 
Chapter XXI. 

* Bear in mind that this was the first conversation Sir Edward? 
Grey had held with the German ambassador since the meeting of 
July 4. 



THE FACTS ABOUT THE " DEMANDS " 149 

Sir Edward Grey, and thus, of course, understood by public 
opinion. There were discussions on the basis of a negotia- 
tion agreed upon by both parties certainly not later than 
the second week in July (perhaps in the middle of June) 
whereby Germany had undertaken to recognise a French 
Protectorate over Morocco subject to economic guarantees, 
and in exchange for a territorial compensation in the 
French Congo, which Germany on her part was disposed 
to make easier for the French Government to grant by 
ceding German territory to France. The speech of M. de 
Selves, the French Foreign Minister, in the French 
Chamber, of December 14 has made this clear beyond the 
possibility of doubt in the following words : — 

" Very well ! '' M. de Selves describes the German 
Foreign Secretary as having stated, "^ We can arrange 
some exchanges. We will abandon you Togoland, we will 
make you territorial concessions in the Upper Cameroons. 
But this is what we ask/*^ 

" Void ce que nous demandons " does not mean this 
5s what we demand, but this is what we ash. Not much 
of the Dick Turpin stand-and-deliver kind of thing about 
this. 

It will be seen that M. de Selves' account tallies with 
the German's Chancellor's : — 

'* At no stage in the negotiations was any language 
used, any idea mooted, in any quarter which would have 
been incompatible with the honour of one of either party. 
There was never any occasion for the * banging on the 
table with the fist ' which was recommended to us. "^ 

So much for the mischievous legend which has been 
incessantly dinned into the -ears of the British public. And, 
observe another feature of it. Neither the Times in its 
original pronouncement of July 20, nor Sir Edward Grey 
in defence of his policy in the House, said one word about 
the offers with which Germany accompanied her so-called 
"demands." Yet Sir Edward Grey, at least, must have 
known of them if, as he says, and as the French Foreign 
Minister says, the French Government kept him constantly 

^Journal Officiel, December 14, 191 1. 

2 British White Book. Cd. 5970. It may be well to state that 
the German Chancellor's personal character is regarded in Germany 
as highly as Sir Edward Grey's personal character is regarded among 
us. 



I50 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

informed of the course of the negotiations. In suggest- 
ing the surrender of Togoland the German Government 
was offering a small but flourishing little dependency, the 
only self-supporting German dependency overseas, and one 
which enjoys the reputation — as students of West Africa 
have long been aware — of being splendidly administered ; 
a dependency where more genuine work has been accom- 
plished than in the whole of the mismanaged and mal- 
administered French Congo up to date. She also offered 
German Bornu — i.e. the Upper Cameroons. 

Now, as to the exact area in the French Congo — the 
area indicated in the Times' announcement map — round 
which the discussions had centred at one time, probably 
about the third week of July. In this particular direction 
some obscurity still remains. M. de Selves' version is that 
when Germany's desires for this area were manifested — we 
may assume in the absence of any positive indication that it 
was on or about July 1 8 — he declined to entertain them, and 
that the discussions were temporarily suspended. The 
German version differs. Without affording us any addi- 
tional means of ascertaining whether the Times' announce- 
ment coincided with the stage when the discussions were 
concerned with this particular part of the French Congo, 
the German version is to the effect that the temporary 
suspension of the discussions was taken on the initiative of 
Germany as a protest against the direct or indirect action 
•of the French Government in violating a secrecy mutually 
.agreed upon. Here is the passage from the German 
Foreign Secretary's speech bearing on the incident : — 

** The negotiations had begun; both parties had mutu- 
ally agreed to observe the strictest secrecy. We took this 
obligation seriously, and did not even inform our allies. 
France adopted a different course, and unfortunately com- 
municated not only to the Press, but, it appears, also in 
part to her friends, information which, inaccurate and 
incomplete as it was, was calculated to arouse suspicion as 
to our intentions. We therefore did not negotiate further 
for a time so long as the secrecy of the negotiations was 
not guaranteed." 

The reader must form his own conclusions on these 
<:onflicting statements. In any case the suspension of 
<liscussion was brief, because M. Cainbon and the German 
Foreign Secretary met again on the 24th. , 



BRITISH DIPLOMATIC OBJECTIONS 151 

There is, however, a certain amount of external evidence 
•to suggest that M. de Selves' story of a prompt rejection of 
the German proposal to cede the maritime region of the 
French Congo, from the point of view of French interests, 
of course, must be. taken cum grano sails. Apart from 
the size of the territory indicated by the German Foreign 
Secretary, when he and M. Cambon were wagging their, 
respective heads in amiable converse^ over a map of Africa, 
there was no special reason why the French Government 
should have been less willing to cede this part of the French 
Congo than any other part, for instance, than the part 
France did eventually cede. (The size no doubt represented 
the opening feature of most bargains where a man who 
wants asks the maximum, and the man w^ho has to give 
sets out the m,inim,um he is prepared to concede ; moreover, 
there were the German proposals of a cession of German 
territory to be set against it.) Indeed, in several well- 
known quarters in France, notably in Le Tem,ps of 
November 4, and in the able articles of Commandant 
Thomasson in the Questions diplom^atiques et Coloniales , 
ito select two opinions out of a number, the belief finds 
expression that France's interests would havje been much 
^better served by the surrender of a portion at least of the 
■maritime zone than of the central zone actually ceded. The 
.arguments supporting this view are technical but powerful. 
.But if French interests would not have suffered, the British 
•diplomatic machine which affects to regard an increase of 
'Germany's sea-board possessions in any part of the world 
-as a menace to the security of the Empire, was, there is 
.^ood reason to think, strongly averse to a Franco-German 
settlement which would have prolonged the German 
Cameroons coast-line and added to it a good natural port,^ 
'Over and above t4ie one it already possesses. In this con- 
nection the following passage in the Times editorial of July 
.26 is significant — 

** There are districts in the interior which might suit 
<jermany as well as the coast-line, and the acquisition of 
which by her might not arouse other susceptibilities in the 
fsame degree." 

1 Instead of the picture mentally conjured up by the ordinary 
Englishman upon reading the Times of July 20, viz., that of the 
.unfortunate French ambassador shrinking before the brutal ultimatum 
of the German Foreign Secretary. 

5 Libreville. 



152 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

For my part, although I admit that inferential evidence 
is all that can be advanced, I am fully convinced that the 
British diplomatic machine put great pressure upon the 
French Government not to cede any part of the French 
Congo coast-line, and so drove the compensation settlement 
in a direction which surely will prove far more disad- 
vantageous to the French, if only because it offers in- 
numerable causes for further local friction between the 
two Powers. The settlement actually arrived at is, indeed^ 
what M. Millerand termed it in the French Chamber 
'* une solution biscornue/' and a glance at the map must 
be sufficient to convince any one of the trouble which may 
lie ahead with such a frontier and such a settlement^ 
interposing, as it does, two German antennce between the 
French possessions in the north and in the south. 

But the chief fact to remember so far as the French 
Congo is concerned, is that Sir Edward Grey was willing 
to take the line against Germany he did over the exact 
locality and area of African jungle which Germany should 
acquire as compensation for recognising a French protec- 
torate over Morocco ! 

And what can one say of Sir Edward Grey's renewed 
raising of the ** partition " bogey in the light of facts? His 
defence of his policy in the House was delivered, 
unfortunately, before the debate in the French Chamber, 
so that members did not possess at that moment the French 
version of the events of July.^ Had they possessed it 
they would have known not only that the French Govern- 
ment was entirely opposed to bringing Spain into the 
negotiations with Germany in any way, and never 
entertained the idea, but that, as stated at the head of 
Chapter XX., the German Government from the very 
beginning of the negotiations was fully prepared to recog- 
nise the principle of a French Protectorate over Morocco ! 

M. de Selves' statement is categorical. After explain- 
ing that when he became Foreign Minister (June 28) dis- 
cussions between France and Germany had been proceed-* 
ing for some time — first at Berlin, then again at Kissingen 
— arising out of Germany's view that the Act of Algeciras 
had been ** profoundly modified " by the French mili- 
tary occupation of Fez and of many districts in Morocco ,' 
M. de Selves went on to say that the French Government 

iThe debate in the House took place on Noivenniber 27. Th^e 
French debates began on December 14. 



M. DE SELVES' REVELATIONS 153 

had laid down from the first that France must be the 
predominating Power in Morocco and could not allow any 
Power (other than Spain) to take a footing there. The 
"German Government had at once agreed — 

"Right (soit!) We accept. Take Morocco, esta- 
blish therein your Protectorate. But, since you have 
made a treaty with England in this matter, that vou have 
made a treaty with Italy, that you have made a treaty with 
Spain, on what basis will you treat with us? Our public 
opinion will not permit that we should not obtain com- 
pensation elsewhere for our abandonment in your favour 
and the undertaking we shall give you that our diplomacy 
will assist in getting the Powers to ratify the arrangement 
we arrive at. "^ 

And later on in his speech M. de Selves showed with 
equal clearness the spontaneity of the German attitude — 
that it was not on the part of the German Government 
a yielding to the inevitable, but of a position mutually 
assumed from the outset — 

** People have asked why territorial concessions were 
thus spoken of. Why had these questions been examined ? 
I have already told you, it is because the First Word 
WHICH THE German Foreign Minister had pronounced 
had consisted in saying : * Morocco you shall have it. ' He 
had even added, ' Establish therein your Protectorate, 
draw up yourselves the arrangement which shall specify 
the details. '"2 

Thus the French Government itself testifies to the 
absolute straightforwardness of the German Government's 

1 " L 'allemagne nous a dit : Soit! nous acceptons. Prenez le 
Maroc, installez y votre protectorat. Mais, alors que vous avez traits 
avec I'Angleterre k cette occasion, que vous avez trait6 avec I'ltalie^ 
•que vous avez trait6 avec I'Espagne, sur quelles bases traiterez-vous 
avec nous? Notre opinion publique ne permet pas que nous 
n'obtenions pas par ailleurs quelque compensation h. I'abandon que 
nous allons vous consentir et k la promesse que nous allons vous 
donner que notre diplomatie s'emploiera k faire ratifier par les puis- 
sances I'accord que nous aurons conclu." {Journal Officiel, 14 
December, 191 1.) 

2'* On s'est demandiS pourquoi il avait ete ainsi parle de ces ces- 
sions territoriales. Pourquoi ces questions 1^ avaient ete examinees? 
prononc^e le ministre des affairs §trang6res en Allemange avait con- 
sist^ k dire: ' Le Maroc, vous I'aurez' — il avait meme ajoute ; ' in- 
stallez-y-votre protectorat, libellez vous-meme I'accord qui doit en 
determiner les precisions.' " Journal Officiel, 14 December igii.) 



154 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

attitude from the first, corroborating the official German^ 
declaration to the British ambassador at Berlin oa 
July 12. 

If Sir Edward Grey was kept continually posted by the- 
French Government of what was going on, as he says- 
he was, and as the French Foreign Minister says he was^ 
Sir Edward Grey knew before the second week in July 
had expired that the German Government not only 
meditated no partition of Morocco with France and Spain, 
but had, on the contrary, spontaneously admitted the 
principle of a French Protectorate over that State subject 
to economic pledges and compensation elsev.'here — which 
were to form the subject of negotiations. 

He knew that from the French. 

On July 12 the German Government gave him an official 
assurance to the same effect. 

Yet, on July 21, he adopted a course of action which 
in the ultimate resort very nearly brought about a rupture 
with Germany — which would have meant a European 
war — and which did, in fact, produce the state of tension 
still unhappily prevailing, and which the British Govern- 
ment is now endeavouring, under the spur of public 
opinion, to remove. 

[New Note. — The French Yellow Book {Affaires du 
Maroc, VI. 1910-12) published after this volume appeared, 
contains, inter alia, an account of the famous interview 
between Herr von Kiderlen Waechter, the German 
Secretary of State, and M. Cambon, the French 
Ambassador, which was so disastrously distorted in the 
Times of July 20. The interview took place on July 16. 
On July 19 a distorted account of it appeared in Le Matin 
of Paris. It is No. 455 of the Yellow Book. M. Cambon 's 
despatch begins by recalling how the conversation opened 
from the standpoint " precedently " agreed to by the 
Secretary of State, viz., Germany's willingness to recog- 
nise in favour of France the altered condition of affairs 
in Morocco. M. Cambon reports that this fundamental 
point having been disposed of, he then asked the Secretary 
of State for his views as to the form that compensation 
should take. The Secretary of State replied, according 
to M. Cambon, thus — 

* * He told me that he had only formed vague ideas (qu'U 
n'avait que des indications tres g^ndrales) and having sent 



MAP IV. 




Stan/bTxis Geogl- EstaJbP,LonjdjorC 



Map indicating the area which formed at one time in the Franco-German 
negotiations the subject of special discussion. 



) 



MAP V. 



ENGLISH MIL ES 

lOO 50 O too 200 

FRENCH 
WEST AFRICA 



.../AN GL O - E GYP T IAN 



SUDAN 




StemfoTdJs Ceoj?- Estai/f,Zondori 



Area ceded by France to Germany under the Convention of November 4, 191 1 | 
Area ceded by Germany to France under the same Convention - - - - 



[II] 



THE FAMOUS INTERVIEW 155 

for a map, he showed me the French Congo from the sea 
to the Sangha. " 

M. Cambon rephed that it was too much, whereupon 
the Secretary of State said that — 

** He would be <iisposed to offer us the northern part 
of the Cameroons, and even Togoland, according to what 
we gave." 

M. Cambon objected that the area indicated by the 
Secretary of State would cut off the French Congo 
hinterland from access to the sea. 

There ensued a fencing bout of words between these 
two practised diplomats, in the course of which each venti- 
lated the case of his Government, and went over old 
ground. The conversation, in the words of the French 
Ambassador, closed as follows — 

** Finally I closed by saying : ' The point is whether you 
want to come to terms. Speak in that sense to your 
colleague at the Colonial Office. When do you expect to 
see him? ' * To-morrow,* he replied, 'and we can meet 
again at the beginning of next week, Monday or Tuesday. 
I shall let you know.' " 

The above are the closing words of the despatch. The 
Congo Free State was not mentioned in the course of the 
conversation. — Author. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

THE AFTERMATH OF THE EVENTS OF JULY 20 AND 21. 

Mr. Lloyd George's speech, and especially the inter- 
pretation (uncorrected on our side) placed upon it by the 
French and British Press, immediately led to very 
strained relations between the two Governments, while the 
Press of the three countries lashed itself into a state of fury. 
When diplomatists talk about ** Public Opinion" being 
incensed, they turn a blind eye upon their owr per- 
formances in bringing that condition about ; posmg as 
peacemakers, whereas, more often than not, the responsi- 
bility is wholly theirs. In his speech in the House on 
November 27 Sir Edward Grey expressed the opinion that 
the diplomatists ought to be congratulated upon having 
prevented war in view of the * * political alcoholism ' ' which 
had prevailed — a sample of diplomatic irony which would, 
indeed, be hard to beat. For who mixed the alcoholic 
brew which the public partook of? Mr. Lloyd George's 
speech was comparable to the action of a man who, 
observing a smouldering fire, pours upon it a can full of 
kerosene and then seeks to place the blame upon the on- 
lookers because the flames leap up to Heaven. That 
speech set the whole world by vthe ears, and, then, for- 
sooth, the world is at fault ! // Sir Edward Grey did not 
intend the speech as a menace why did he not, when he saw 
the interpretation placed upon it by the Times next morn- 
ing (the 22nd), at once correct the impression it had pro- 
duced, in order to prevent the flames from spreading ? 

Sir Edward Grey's conversation with the German 
ambassador on the 21st had, as we have seen, been 
immediately transmitted to Berlin. It was the first 
conversation in the course of which Sir Edward Grey had 
defii itely asked for information and formulated more than 
vagLe suspicions. It was the first time Sir Edward Grey 
had raised the question of the ' * compensation ' ' negotia- 
tions then proceeding between France and Germany. The 
German Government's answer was in London two days 
after the conversation. Why in the world could not Sir 
Edward Grey have waited for that answer? Was it fair 
to Germany, was it statesmanlike, was it even reasonable 

156 



A SATIRE UPON *' CIVILISATION " 157 

ithat as soon as the German ambassador had left the 
Foreign Office Sir Edward Grey should arrange for Mr. 
Lloyd George to make a speech that very evening — a 
speech suggesting that Germany was treating us as of no 
account in the Cabinet of nations, and that we should go 
to war with her if she did not mend her manners? What 
teirible performances could the wretched little Panther with 
its complement of one hundred and twenty-five officers 
and men have carried out in the interval? Why this pre- 
cipitation to credit ** native rumours " that the Panther^ s 
formidable naval contingent was landing and negotiating 
with the tribes? Since when have we based a hectoring 
attitude towards a great Power on the strength of ** native 
rumours " which, apparently, were not believed in Paris^ 
and which turned out to have no foundation in fact? 

But for the Lloyd-George speech it may be assumed 
that the atmosphere of ill-will and suspicion against Ger- 
many, the mingled parti-pris and reluctance frankly to ask 
for the further explanations seemingly required which had 
reigned at the Foreign Office since July i , would have been 
dissipated by the German Government's reply. 

As it was, an ** exceedingly stiff " interview took place 
between Sir Edward Grey and the German ambassador on 
the 24th. Both Governments hereafter stood on their 
** dignity," and millions of men and women who knew 
nothing of the whole miserable business, the vast majority 
of whom could certainly not have pointed out Morocco on 
the map, were on the verge of being precipitated into all 
the horro|pf all the miseries and privations and losses of a 
great war as the result thereof. 

Could there be a more scathing satire upon ** civilisa- 
tion "? Could there be a greater travesty of human 
government ? Do not all the proposals for preventing such 
a state of affairs, such as greater publicity on foreign 
questions, greater public control of the diplomats, the 
break-up of the caste system in diplomacy, and so forth, 
immature, and incomplete, and unthought-out as they may 
be, appear the very embodiment of common sense as 
compared with that state of affairs itself? 

1 ** Mais il nous est apparu, d'apr^s nos renseignements, que si 
rAllemagne envoyait un bateau k Agadir, elle n'avait pas I'intention 
d'y op^rer un d'^barquement.*' (M. de Selves in the French Cham- 
ber, December 14, 1911.) 



158 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Both Governments stood on their ** dignity" — the word 
is Sir Edward Grey's, not mine. In view of the Lloyd 
George speech, which the German Government looked upon 
as a threat, that Government declared it could not 
authorise Sir Edward Grey to make public use of the pledge 
given on the 12th to the effect that Germany had no terri- 
torial designs on Morocco. German public opinion, the 
German Government argued, would look upon such a 
declaration at that moment as a retreat before a British 
menace. Sir Edward Grey, for his part, could not, in view 
of the very stiff tone adopted by the German ambassador, 
condescend to give any public explanation as to Mr. Lloyd 
George's speech. Such an explanation would not have 
been compatible with the dignity of Great Britain. 

On the 27th, a further conversation took place between 
Sir Edward Grey and the German ambassador, and the 
high-and-mighty attitude on both sides was to some extent 
departed from. The Prime Minister's speech in the House 
that evening showed a very different tone. There is some 
reason for believing that several Members of the Cabinet 
had expressed themselves pretty vigorously on the subject 
of Mr. Lloyd George's speech. Be that as it may, Mr. 
Asquith declared that he thought an issue of the Franco- 
German negotiations without prejudice to British interests 
quite possible, and earnestly desired such a solution. The 
British Government did not dream of interfering with 
territorial arrangements between the two Powers outside 
Morocco. Any statements that the British Government 
had so interfered were "mischievous inventions without 
the faintest foundation in fact." An utterance which in 
the light of iacts can only be described as amazing. 

Still the effect intended was produced. The relations 
between the two Governments became less strained. . But 
henceforth the bickering of the Governments became 
drowned in the popular anger. The mischief had gone too 
far. The wound was too deep and recent for the plaster 
to adhere. The whole of Germany, without distinction of 
party or class, was rocking and seething with indignation, 
at what it regarded as an insulting and unwarrantable inter- 
ference on the part of Great Britain in the negotiations with 
France, as an arrogant British embargo upon Germany 
acquiring territory in Equatorial Africa, as proof that 
Britain was determined to block and hamper Germany's 
expansion ; that, in short, Germany had been deliberately 
and wantonly provoked. Far from dying down, this feeling 



IS THERE A WAY OUT? 159 

gathered intensity with the weeks, and there is not, 
unhappily, the slightest doubt that the German Foreign 
Secretary interpretated with absolute accuracy the popular 
sentiment held by the entire German nation when he said — 

** If the English Government had intended to com- 
plicate and embroil the political situation, and to bring 
about a violent explosion, they would certainly have chosen 
no better means than the speech of the Chancellor of the 
Exchequer, which took so little into account for us the 
dignity and position of a Great Power which was claimed 
by him for England."^ 

Finally, can we wonder that this view should be held, 
and should have crystallized into conviction since the Faber 
revelations and their sequelae ? 

To-day we are confronted with this situation. 

The German nation firmly believes not only that it is 
threatened by Great Britain, but that Great Britain intends 
to take the first favourable opportunity to force a war. 

The British nation knows itself to be absolutely 
innocent of any such desire or intention. 

Is there a way out of the impasse? Only, it seems to 
me, if British public opinion will think out the problem for 
itself, face the issues squarely and resolutely, and decline 
any longer to tolerate being in the position of finding itself 
involved in war without any real knowledge of the why 
and the wherefore. 

Meanwhile let us note the substantial advantages which 
British interests have reaped from Germany's double 
intervention in Morocco. 

I British White Book, Cd. 5992. - 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE FRANCO-GERMAN SETTLEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS UPON 
BRITISH INTERESTS. 

So far as Morocco is concerned, the conclusion finally 
reached in the Franco-German negotiations and embodied 
in the Convention of November 4, 1911, constitutes a 
reversal of the Public Law of Europe formulated in the 
Algeciras Act. Subject, of course, to the agreement of 
the signatory Powers — which may be taken for granted — 
the independence and integrity of Morocco disappear. 

For that independence and integrity, a French Pro- 
tectorate is substituted on certain conditions. 

France thus gets her way, and adds^ on paper, 219,00a 
square miles and some eight million inhabitants to her 
Colonial Empire. 

Germany abandons her long fight for Moroccan in- 
dependence in exchange for guarantees as to equality of 
treatment in economic matters, upon which I shall touch 
in a moment, receiving as compensation 107,270 square 
miles of the French Congo, sparsely populated and of mode- 
rate intrinsic value, and ceding to France 6,450 square 
miles of German territory in the Upper Cameroons by way 
of quid pro quo. Even a casual glance at the Convention 
will show that the utmost goodwill on both sides will be 
required if its provisions, as they affect both Morocco and 
the French Congo, are to work out harmoniously in 
practice, and several years must, in any case, elapse during 
which the French and German Governments will be 
engaged in constant discussions arising out of those pro- 
visions. It will also be apparent from Article 16 of the 
Congo section of the Convention that the way has been left 
open for the question of the Congo State (or Belgian^ 
Congo) to be raised on some future occasion — a question 
which involves the interests of Belgium and those of Great 
Britain, as well as those of France and Germany, and,, 
nominally at least, the interests of all the signatory Powers 
of the Berlin Act of 1885. 

160 



RELATIONS OF FRANCE AND GERMANY x6i 

It is obvious, therefore, that this settlement must 
multiply the possibilities of friction between the two 
Powers to a very considerable extent, since it leaves many 
highly controversial problems in Morocco itself unsettled, 
since it adds to their land frontier in Europe a greatly 
extended land frontier in equatorial Africa, and since it 
places — on the basis of a political agreement defining a 
variety of specific stipulations — their economic interests in 
close contact in Morocco. Conversely, this settlement may 
conduce, if handled tactfully and with a genuine desire for 
a political and economic co-operation, to bring the two 
Powers more closely together upon a field of common 
endeavour, than they have ever been before.^ 

In any event, the relations of France and Germany 
cannot be the same in the future as they have been in the 
past. They must be more continuous, more intimate, 
more complicated, affording greater opportunities for 
interference to a foreign diplomacy that, inspired by 
interested friendliness towards one of them, might be 
disposed to the display of unfriendliness towards the other. 
That is the chief conclusion of a general character which 
can be drawn from the understanding which has been 
reached; and it is eminently satisfactory, as conveying 
proof of the real wishes of both Governments, that they 
should have mutually agreed to refer differences of inter- 
pretation to the Hague Tribunal and disputes as to the 
delimitation of the new Congo frontier to an independent 
arbitrator. 

Examining these documents at close quarters it wuU be 
observed that Germany has been able to secure for the trade 
of all nations in Morocco, conditions, unlimited by time, 
infinitely more advantageous than the situation in which 
the British Government was content to leave international 
commercial interests by the Anglo-French Declaration of 
1904. British trading interests in particular may take full 
measure of the debt which they owe to the double German 
intervention in Morocco by recollecting how those 
interests, at present ranking foremost in importance, were 
neglected by their own Government in 1904. Under the 
1904 Treaties the open door for ordinary trade was limited 

iFar-seeing Frenchmen — as far removed from one another in 
political thought as M. Jaur^s and Senator de Lamarzelle— realise 
this perfectly, and both in the Chamber and in the Senate have 
publicly given expression to the obvious truth, viz., that the Con- 
vention of November, 191 1, is workable only if the general attitude of 
Germany and France becomes inspired by genuine good-will. 



i62 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

to thirty years only. Apart from ordinary trading trans- 
actions, not only was no provision made for a British share 
in the enormous number of pubhc works — railways and 
harbour-works, electric light installations, mining plant, 
telegraphs, post offices, and so on — which the opening up 
of Morocco will entail, besides the endless purchases of 
material, stores, etc., which a Moroccan Government 
equipped on modern lines will require, but as a study of 
the Franco-Spanish secret Conventions of 1904 and 1905 
(especially the former, which was submitted to and 
approved by the British Government) will show, this un- 
limited field of enterprise was virtually handed over, lock, 
stock, and barrel, to a Franco-Spanish monopoly. 

After binding down the French Government to equality 
in trade matters in every direction whereby a loop-hole 
might be found for favoured treatment despite the non- 
existence of a differential tariff, Germany has secured 
the expansion — certain to be very large — of the iron-ore 
industry from being restricted by export duties, and has 
imposed a common treatment for all mining undertakings, 
particularly stipulating that no taxes, uniformly levied, 
shall be privately remitted in favour of a given company. 
Germany has insisted upon open tenders for all contracts 
for public works and supply of material, under conditions 
of time and circumstance which shall not place the subjects 
of any one Power in a position of inferiority. She has 
postulated that all nations shall be equally privileged to par- 
ticipate in the actual working of great public undertakings, 
and that industrial and mining concerns shall not be 
hampered in laying down light railways to connect their 
enterprises with a port of shipment. She has thought 
problems out ahead with remarkable thoroughness. In 
every respect minute precautions have been taken by 
Germany that international enterprises of every kind are as 
assured as public pledges can make them, of an absolutely 
fair fiel4 and no favour. That in so doing Germany has 
sought to benefit her own nationals goes without saying, 
but in benefiting them she has benefited the nationals of 
every great commercial Power, and notably Great Britain. 
Morocco is not to become another Tunis or Madagascar, 
and British trade and enterprise, shabbily treated in both 
owing to the well-known fixed rule of French policy over- 
seas and the incapacity of the British Foreign Office, has to 
thank, not its own Government, but the German Govern- 
ment for the fact. The anger and dismay which fills a 



BRITISH INTERESTS 163 

certain school in France at contemplating these restrictions 
upon time-honoured French Colonial methods may be 
•surmised by perusing some of the speeches made in the 
-course of the Moroccan debate in the French Chamber last 
December. M. Caillaux, the then Premier, met these com- 
plaints in a broad and statesmanlike manner, but which did 
not tend to increase his popularity. It may be hoped that 
the French Government will not yield to the importunities 
it is bound to be plagued with by the initiators of 
*' affaires," who haunt the Quai d'Orsay} the Pavilion de 
Flore^ and the editorial sanctuaries of Parisian newspapers 
not a few ; but that it will carry out the economic condi- 
tions attaching to its acquisition of political control over 
Morocco, both in the letter and in the spirit. 

As the economic aspect of the Moroccan section of the 
Convention is all in favour of British commercial interests, 
so is the arrangement under which some 160,000 square 
miles of equatorial African territory pass from French to 
^Genmn control. The increased area of German Cameroon 
and the decreased area of the French Congo, it cannot be 
too emphatically asserted, is a distinct and unquestionable 
gain for British commerce. In the Cameroon, Germiany 
has always treated British trade and British merchants on 
a level of absolute equality with her own. Nay, more, as 
the directors of one of the largest British firms and the 
oldest therein established have recently testified,^ the 
'German local authorities have repeatedly gone out of their 
way to show courtesy to our merchants and to assist them 
in their business, so far as a local West African Govern- 
iment can do so. Messrs. John Holt speak in the highest 
terms of their treatment at the hands of the Germans. 
I have reason to know that their experience is by no 
means singular. Contrast that story with the notoriously 



1 French Foreign Office. 2 French Colonial Office. 

3 Messrs. John Holt & Co., of Liverpool. A curious and signifi- 
xant story attaches to this firm's testimony affecting a purely British 
interest. During the crisis last, autumn, when British newspapers 
were repeating ad nauseam the unfounded statement that Germany 
■differentiated against British goods in her oversea possessions, Messrs. 
John Holt & Co. wrote a letter to a certain very prominent British 
newspaper, inspired by no love for Germany, describing their own 
experiences in the Cameroon. The letter was acknowledged. As three 
weeks later it had still not appeared, Messrs. John Holt & Co. sent a 
copy to the Manchester Guardian, which published it. It was after- 
awards widely .reproduced in England and Germany. 



i64 TEN YEARS OF .SECRET DIPLOMACY 

abominable manner in which British trade has been per- 
secuted in the French Congo, where France has violated! 
the Act of Berlin in the most flagrant way.^ 

In this connection it is difficult not to apprehend future 
complications arising- from the contradictory character of 
Articles 5 and 12 of the Convention. By the former the 
German Government undertakes to respect the concessions 
granted by the French Government to certain financiers in 
the part of French Congo which has now become German. 
By the latter both Governments bind themselves to observe 
the commercial clauses of the Berlin Act which those con- 
cessions grossly violate. In point of fact the whole area 
which Germany has acquired, with the exception of an 
infinitesimal corner of it, has been long subjected to that 
iniquitous system of pillage of the natural riches of the 
country accompanied by forced labour which the French 
Colonial Party forced upon the French Colonial Minister 
of the day in emulation of King Leopold, and largely 
through his personal intrigue. And eighteen months ago; 
this particular rubber syndicate obtained a ten years further 
lease of life from the French Government. If respect for 
this arrangement is to be taken in a literal sense, it means, 
that the Act of Berlin will continue to be violated in the 
ceded territory for ten years longer, to the detriment of" 
the natives and of international trade alike, and that 
Cameroon merchants, whatever nationality they may be- 
long to, will be unable to extend their business to the new 
German territory. Such a state of things would be so. 
clearly alien to Germany's policy and to German interests 
that it may be hoped some way may be found out of the 
difficulty, and that Germany may be able to set an example 
in relation to this matter, of faithful adherence to inter- 
national Treaties which besides, in this particular instance^ 
redounding to the benefit of black humanity and legitimate- 
trade,^ will free her hands when presently (as I devoutly 
hope she may, and, if the Foreign Office by that time is- 
cured of its Teutophobia, in concert with Britain) she sets- 



1 Vide, inter alia, " The British Case in French Congo " (Heine- 
mann, 1902), and the paper in the Contemporary Review for Decem- 
ber, 191 1, by the author. 

2 The Conccssionnaire system in equatorial Africa involves and 
necessitates the most horrible abuses, of which the world has had an* 
unforgettable object-lesson in King Leopold's management of the 
Congo State. 



THE CONGO SETTLEMENT 165 

herself to insist upon the Belgians fulfilling their Treaty 
obligations in the Congo State. ^ 

Politically speaking, the form the French Congo terri- 
torial compensation has eventually taken is extremclv 
awkward and inconvenient for the French and irritating 
for the Germans. A study of the map and of the Appendix. 
Avill suffice to make this plain to any one. Geographically 
it is an impossible arrangement, and a well-informed 
French friend compares it to the accumulation of barrels 
of international gunpowder along the banks of the Congo, 
Either of the plans first discussed would have been better 
than this solution, i.e. if the territory ceded had been 
further south, Gaboon-wards ; or it the German river 
frontage in the ceded territory had spread over the inter- 
vening space between the two existing antennce or horns 
(see map). The former need not have been so extensive as 
the Germans originally asked — in exchange for a consider- 
ably larger German territory than they have actually con- 
ceded — but it might well have embraced the basins of the 
Ogowe and Kwilou, following a straight line, parallel with 
the 1 2th Parallel, to the Congo State frontier. There 
would then have been no ** cutting in two " of the French 
dependency, and communication between the Middle and 
Upper French Congo and the coast would not have been 
modified, since it is and has always been, entirely dependent 
upon the Belgian railway from Stanley Pool to Matadi. 
But, as indicated in Chapter XXII., the British diplomatic 
machine was opposed to the extension of the German coast- 
line and to Germany acquiring Libreville, which, in all 
probability, was the immediate cause of the uproar of Julv 
20 and 21. The second solution, which was actually pro- 
posed by M. Caillaux, was defeated, or rather modified, 
by the opposition worked up in Paris to the ** cutting in 
two " idea. As a matter of fact, the solution actually 
adopted has consecrated this disadvantage, without any of 
the compensating advantages in the shape of absence of 
future friction, which the present arrangement inevitably 
entails. 

An interesting feature of the Convention is the cession 
of France's right of pre-emption over Spanish Guinea, the 

1 Representations in regard to this problem have already been made 
to the German Government by the German Congo League and the 
German Colonial Society, and to the British Government by the 
Newcastle, and, I think, other Chambers of Commerce. 



i66 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Corisco Islands, and the Elobey Islands, should Spain be 
willing to sell these places to Germany. Equally interest- 
ing, and far more important, is Article i6, whereby 
France's right of pre-emprion over the Congo State is- 
modified to such an extent as to have become, practically 
speaking, non-existent. Germany has secured that if the 
Congo State ever comes into the market through the un- 
willingness or inability of the Belgians to control it, the 
signatory Powers of the Berlin Act must adjudicate as to 
its future. German insistence upon this provision was,, 
doubtless, inspired by the knowledge — which the Congo 
Reform Association, I may say, also obtained early in 1909 
— that France had made tentative proposals to Germany 
and Great Britain, at the time that King Leopold and his 
Parliament were wrangling over the terms under which- 
the Congo State was to be annexed, for a Franco-British- 
German partition of the Congo State. Article 16 places- 
the Congo State question in its international aspects on the 
terrain from which M. Jules Ferry succeeded in 1884 
secretly and behind the back of the Powers, in removlng- 
it — i.e. upon its true basis as an international problem. 

A brief reference may be made in conclusion to France's- 
dispute with Spain which presumably will be settled before 
this book is in print. ^ As British strategic policy requires 
that Spain shall remain in possession of Mediterranean and 
North Atlantic Morocco, it may be presumed — unless Sir 
Edward Grey gives way — that she will retain Larash and 
El-Kasr (despite the annoyance of the French Colonials, 
who have been indulging in sundry threats about sundering 
the entente, if the British Government does not force Spain 

•IThe origin of the Franco-Spanish dispute is, briefly, this: 
France declares that Spain, in occupying Larash and El-Kasr, has 
violated the secret Convention of 1904, because that Convention only 
recognised Spain's right to occupy these places with French consent, 
and so long as the status quo of Morocco was not altered. Spain 
replies that France had herself altered the status quo by occupying 
Fez and the surrounding country, and that as regards French consent, 
that Spain twice asked for French consent between April and June 
of last year, and only decided to act when France withheld that con- 
sent — unjustly, in view of her own performances. In other words, 
as Felicien Challaye puts it most excellently in "La Vie Inter- 
nationale " : ** Thus this initial dispute has for its primary cause the 
duplicity which both France and Spain have displayed in regard to 
Morocco, both having undertaken to respect its independence and 
integrity, both having worked in secret to partition and conquer 
Morocco." The truth could not be more tersely stated. 



POSITION OF TANGIER 167 

to clear out of those places) ; abandoning Ifni and perhaps 
the Rio del Oro region on the South Atlantic to France. 
It may be hoped that the forthcoming Franco-Spanish 
settlement will regularise the doubtful and peculiar position 
in which Tangier is left by this hotch-potch of treaties 
superseded^ treaties set aside, old treaties, new treaties, 
secret treaties, and public treaties — the strategic im- 
portance of Tangier being, of course, for Britain a matter 
of considerable moment.^ 

1 Sundry French Colonial papers have insisted that France must be 
politically preponderant at Tangier, and that the future Tangier-Fez 
railway must be wholly in French hands, even when it passes 
through Spanish territory. These statements must not, however, be 
taken too seriously. More significant is the fact that Germany has 
not taken Spain into account at all in dealing with France, but has 
recognised a French Protectorate (subject, of course, to the conditions 
specified) to the whole of Morocco, the Spanish zone included. This 
makes France technically responsible for the fulfilment in the Spanish 
zone of all the stipulations formulated by Germany in the Convention 
of November, 191 1. This responsibility France has accepted, and 
now seeks to make Spain swallow the additional pill — at which :he 
Spanish gorge rises, partly because it will upset the calculations and 
enterprises of certain influential Spanish concessionnaires. 



CHAPTKR XXV. 

AN APPEAL FROM PREJUDICE TO REASON. 

** The nation does not desire peace at any price. People talk 
about peace at any price, but there is something far worse — and that 
is alliance at any price, and especially alliances the price of which is 
not disclosed." (The Dean of Worcester [Canon Moore Ede], speak- 
ing at the first Annual Meeting of the Church of England Peace 
Congress, January 26, 1912.) 

There are three keys with which to unlock the door to a 
permanent improvement in Anglo-German relations if the 
British people desire it, as I firmly believe they do. 

The first is the honest admission that in the one case 
where a quarrel has occurred over a specific issue — 
Morocco — we have not treated Germany fairly, and that 
Germany has a legitimate grievance against us on that 
score. This I have tried to show from an analysis of the 
facts, not because it was a pleasant thing to do, assuredly 
not because it was a popular thing to do, but because to 
any one who believes an understanding^ with Germany to 
be a supreme British national concern, the national interest 
demanded that it should be attempted. If the thinking 
public after reading this book share that view, a public 
force will have been created to prevent the recurrence of a 
similar episode, whether in connection with further develop- 
ments which the Morocco question with its now inevitable 
annexes the French Congo and Belgian Congo questions 
may have in store for us, or as regards any other specific 
problem which may arise, either in Asia-Minor, in China, 
or in the Portuguese African dependencies. There is no 
need to clothe ourselves in a white sheet for the world's 
sneers. But we shall be no weaker ; we shall be stronger 
if we allow ourselves that we have been misled, quietly 
make up our minds to take the fact into account in our 
future dealings with Germany, and imitate our French 
friends to the extent of insisting upon a final close to the 
era of secret treaty making, whether such secret treaties 

1 Not an alliance, but an understanding. 
168 



WHAT THE NATION SHOULD DECLINE 169 

be between us and another Power, or between other 
Powers, but involving- our national responsibility, as in the 
case of the secret Franco-Spanish Convention of 1904. 

The second key is the indispensable duty that devolves 
upon the House of Commons to ascertain the real nature of 
our relations with France, and if, as the public are assured, 
there are no positive commitments, to insist that neither 
in regard to Morocco nor in regard to any other dispute 
which events may occasion between France and Germany, 
shall this nation's foreign policy be directed as though such 
positive commitments existed. 

It is well to be absolutely plain-spoken in this matter. 
In 1904 Lord Lansdowne was successful in removing 
various specific and long-standing causes of friction 
between ourselves and France by a series of arrangements. 
Only in one of these arrangements was an avenue left 
open for future national liabilities if, as an outcome of it. 
France found herself at loggerheads with another Power. 
Those liabilities were limited, but even in their limitation 
they went beyond what the nation was aware of, or had 
sanctioned, because their nature was kept from the nation. 
Such liabilities as existed were still further reduced by the 
Act of Algeciras. Such as they were before the close of 
the Algeciras Conference, and a fortiori from the date of 
its conclusion, they did not make it incumbent upon this 
nation, either in honour or in law, to support France in 
violating the Act of Algeciras if her Government chose to 
take the risk of doing so without having previously come 
to an understanding with any Power signatory of the Act 
that might consider its interests and rights jeopardised and 
set on one side by such violation ; much less to support 
France to the extent of being prepared to involve this 
-nation in a great war as the outcome of the French Govern- 
ment's proceedings.^ There was an unwarrantable, un- 
sanctioned transmutation of a strictly limited agreement 
with France into an instrument of aggression against the 
Power which challenged France's infringement both /of that 

1 Even those who argue that our commitments to France under 
the Anglo-French Declaration of 1904 were not modified by the Alge- 
ciras Act, cannot assert that the giving of "diplomatic support" to 
France entailed the granting of naval and military support, in face of 
ithe Foreign Office's assertions to the contrary. Let me recall here, 
once more, the statement made by the Foreign Office on November 
.27, 191 1 : "An agreenient to afford diplomatic support does not 
•impose on any Power an obligation either to give or to withhold 
■ military or naval support. " 
[12] 



I70 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Power's interests and rights under its own Treaty with 
Morocco, and under the Algeciras Act. Parliament should 
place beyond doubt or question that this nationally 
unauthorised transmutation must cease. . Parliament 
should place beyond doubt or question that France having, 
thanks to the British Government, succeeded in her long- 
matured design of acquiring a Protectorate over her 
greater part of Morocco, cannot expect us to fight her 
battles for her in any subsequent squabble which may arise 
between her and other Powers over the exercise of her 
Protectorate, any more than she can expect us to play the 
part of wet nurse to her in any other portion of the globe. 
This nation, through its elected representatives, should 
absolutely decline to allow itself to be tied to the cartwheels 
of the French Colonial Party or of any other Party or 
Parties in France. 

Not to make a firm and unambiguous stand now would 
mean for the British people an imending vista of prospec- 
tive and unknown liabilities, with which they would be 
absolutely insane to permit themselves to be saddled. If 
the House of Commons does not pronounce unmistakably 
on the matter it will be betraying its trust to the nation. A 
means must be found for curtailing the virtually unlimited 
discretion of the executive in foreign affairs. On March 
19, 1886, the following resolution was moved in the House 
of Commons by Mr. Richard — 

*' That in the opinion of this House it is not just or 
expedient to embark in war, contract engagements involv- 
ing grave responsibilities for the nation, and add territories 
to the Empire without the knowledge or consent of Parlia- 
ment." 

The motion was only lost by four votes. A similar 
resolution should be brought forward and pressed again 
and again until it passes. 

Moreover, if the British position for the future is not 
made clear, it can only be a matter of time before the 
friendly feeling happily existing between France and our- 
selves will be changed into one of open tension, for the 
simple reason that the nation will not put up with being 
made the cat's-paw of French colonial adventures; neither 
will it put up with a situation whereby it might become 
to-morrow the agent of some one or other ephemeral 
French Government bent upon a war with Germany for the 
recovery of Alsace-Lorraine. The time may come when, if 
the Republican regime cannot purge itself of the financial 



NO FETTERING COMMITMENTS 171 

corruption, the incessant personal intrigues and the 
dangerous irresponsibility which undermine and honey- 
comb the body politic, it will be so shaken as to find in a 
successful war its only chance of survival. That event, if it 
should occur, must find the British people unfettered and 
at liberty to pursue the course best suited to the national 
interest. The disorganised condition of our own Foreign 
Oflfice, the personal rivalries which obtain within it, its 
extraordinarily faulty intelligence system, the way in which 
the embassies abroad have got out of hand through the 
absence of a strong directing head at home with clear ideas 
and personal knowledge of European languages, countries 
and peoples — these things, which, unhappily, do not 
appertain to the region of gossip, but to the realm of fact, 
are in all conscience bad enough. But that the British 
national interest should be in any sense at all tied up with 
the vagaries prevailing in the Public Departments, Parlia- 
mentary lobbies and editorial offices of the French Republic 
is altogether intolerable, and would not be tolerated for 
twenty-four hours by the British people if they realised the 
true position. The revelations of the last few months 
should surely open the eyes of our statesmen to the appall- 
ing state of chaos and intrigue which has been, in part 
only, dragged to light by the French Senatorial investiga- 
tions into the inner history of the Moroccan affair. 

It is in the interest neither of the British nor of the 
French peoples that they should be fettered in their 
intercourse with other peoples ; or committed by their 
Governments to a definite course of action in advance. 
Such commitments play into the hands of certain sections 
in Britain, France, and Germany, who, whether they be 
actuated by motives of honest conviction, or inspired by 
class or personal interests, or merely governed by fixed 
and narrow ideas, are the enemies of peace, which is and 
must be the paramount interest both of the creative ele- 
ments and of the working masses in each country. ^ There 
is such a section in Germany which, seeing, or affecting 
to see, in Great Britain the implacable foe of Germany's 
national and inevitable expansion in commerce, industry 
and power, urges war. There is a section in Great Britain 
which, seeing, or affecting to see, in the growth of Ger- 
many a rival animated by aggressive and sinister designs, 
works for war and would use the entente with France to 

1 Except the manufacturers of war materiai. 



172 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

that end. There is a section in France which, adhering to 
the cult of '' La revanche " and dismayed at a stationary 
if not falUng birth-rate which twenty years hence will 
place the French in a position of conspicuous and incontest- 
able military inferiority par rapport with their eastern 
neighbours, dreams of replenishing the dwindling fighting 
strength of the nation by regiments of brown and black 
Africans, and, agitated and restless, loses no opportunity 
of envenoming Anglo-German relations with the intent of 
using the entente as a lever to precipitate a struggle before 
France has fallen altogether behind Germany in point of 
military numbers. 

The task of the peoples concerned is to find statesmen 
who will shake themselves free from these influences. Or, 
to state the proposition inversely, statesmen worthy of the 
name must shake themselves free of them by taking the 
people more and more into their confidence and appealing 
more and more to the national interest of the vast mass of 
the population to counteract these influences.^ In other 
words, foreign policy must be democratised, which does not 
mean in the least, as certain pompous persons rooted in 
fossilised ideas which no longer respond to the world's 
imperative requirements, urge in panic horror, that dip- 
lomatists should carry on their conversations in the 
public squares, any more than the shipowner informs the 
neighbourhood of his negotiations over a charter-party, or 
the novelist invites his readers to follow the unravelling 
of his plot while he is engaged upon it. 

Especially is it necessary for the common-sense 
elements in the British nation to set their faces like flint 
against the sections in Britain and France desirous of 
distorting the existence of friendly relations with France 
into an instrument of aggression against Germany. If 
Englishmen will stop and think for a moment they will 
realise that the idea sedulously thrust into their brains by 
certain newspapers — the idea that the French are living in 

daily terror of a descent upon them by Germany which, 

• 

IThe surest proof that both the German and the French Govern- 
ments were animated with peaceful intentions in the crisis of last 
summer and autumn, is to be sought in the fact that the great labour 
demonstrations for peace, held in Berlin and Paris respectively, were 
inspired by the respective Governments concerned, acting indepen- 
dently of one another. This has been denied ; but it is true. I 
iiave this on the authority of one of the great Continental Socialist 
leaders. 



POPULAR DELUSIONS 173 

but for a British fleet, would indubitably take place — is on 
the face of it extremely unlikely ; that, as a matter of fact, 
the persistent encouraging- of this idea among us may con- 
ceivably be doing France the greatest disservice by increas- 
ing the power of certain persons, and, perhaps, certain 
forces, in Britain and France anxious to prevent a Franco- 
German rapprochement, not at all, in the former case, as 
an act of love for France, but from a muddle-headed con- 
ception of the national interests of Britain. Let them, for 
example, turn over the following points in their minds. 
Until a few months ago it was a cardinal article of faith 
among us that the German army was the most efficien*^ 
fighting machine in the world. Well, for forty years the 
Imperial controllers of that most efficient fighting machine 
in the world have not once used it for carrying out one or 
other of the numerous schemes with which they have from 
time to time been credited by certain wiseacres in Fleet 
Street, by the compilers of blood-curdling articles in the 
popular magazines, or by excited and badly informed 
politicians. Then, again, if the rulers of Germany 
meditate far-seeing designs of conquest, they would be, 
surely, playing a fool's game to give effect to them now. 
as regards France at any rate. The German population is 
increasing by nearly a million a year. It is now some- 
where in the neighbourhood of sixty-seven millions ; that 
of France somewhere in the neighbourhood of thirty-nine 
millions, and the population of France is slowly declining. 
In another quarter of a century France, for all her incom - 
parable intellectual genius, will, in the ordinary course of 
events, short of some far-reaching internal thought- 
revolution, which is extremely unlikely in view of the 
steady decay of religious faith and the corresponding 
increase in every influence making for the spread of sexual 
licence (or short of an alteration of the map of Europe in 
her favour), have fallen, so far as fighting strength is con 
cerned, immeasurably below the level of Germanic capacity. 
What is a quarter of a century in the life of a nation? 
Germany can afford to wait. Time is on her side, and all 
the evolutions of all the diplomatists in the world cannot 
affect the great national forces at work. Pondering over 
this, Englishmen might well consider whether causes, 
which, in the case of Germany, they are told, operate as a 
prima facie warrant for crediting the existence of German 
designs upon her neighbours, do not apply with equal if not 
greater logic in the case of France. That France must. 



174 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

within the next half century, increase the population own- 
ing allegiance to the French flag, or crumble to ruin, 
approximates at least nearer to the truth than that the 
growth in the German population is a ** world menace." 
An attempt to expand beyond the line of the Vosges might 
be too hazardous to entertain, even now, say within the 
next year or two. Postponed for two decades, or even 
one decade, it would be suicidal. But the risks of expan- 
sion northwards into the Low Countries, or southwards 
beyond the line of the Pyrennees, would not be so consider- 
able. Then, again, the Enghshman who prefers to think for 
himself, instead of letting half a dozen gentlemen invested 
with the power (how often abused, alas !) of transmitting 
their thoughts daily to an aggregate of millions do their 
thinking for them, might ask themselves whether there is 
not a suspicion of crocodillian tactics in this perpetual 
lament over poor, plucky little France, brow-beaten ^y 
brutal, sabre-rattling Germany, combined with the appear- 
ance of learned articles — such, for example, as Colonel 
Repington's^ in the Times — in which we are told, in effect, 
that the German army is very over-rated and inefficient in 
many respects, while the French army is greatly under- 
rated and conspicuously efficient. 

Finally, Englishmen might pause and think for a 
moment whether they are quite sure they are being accu- 
rately informed as to the real sentiments of the peace- 
loving, laborious, thrifty masses of the French nation' 
in regard to Germany and the relations of France with 
Germany. Are they quite sure that the same people who 
invited them to believe that the German Government had 
offended the Russian bureaucracy (misnamed " Russia " 
with pleasing complacency) for at least a generation 
because the Kaiser had stood in shining armour beside his 
ally Austria over the Bosnian business are altogether safe 

1 1 am told by military friends that Colonel Repington's reputation 
as a military expert is internationally recognised. M, Phillippe Millet, 
reviewing these articles in Le Temps of November 21 last, remarks : 
" Although Germany still continues to loom large in the imagination 
of her neighbours by reason of the number of her battalions, and 
because of her admirable mobilisation system, it is beginning to be 
whispered in Europe that the French army excels its rivals in essential 
military qualities. Our weight in the diplomatic scale cannot fail to 
increase if, while conscious of our strength, we are wise enough not 
to relax our efforts." So we cannot have it both ways, and on this 
showing Germany's increased estimates for 1912 respond to necessities 
pointed out by the Times and hailed by Le Temps. 



THE REAL SENTIMENTS OF FRANCE 175 

;g-uides to follow? Have th^y forgotten that this Russian 
bureaucracy was vSO little offended that before two years 
had passed it had concluded a general understanding with 
the German Government known as the Potsdam Agree- 
ment — an agreement which caused these prophets the 
acutest discomposure? Englishmen might be reminded 
of a saying attributed to M. Hanotaux, one of the 
shrewdest politicians who in recent years has wielded the 
French Premiership^ 

*' An Anglo-French alliance destined, whether desired 
or not, to arouse keen anxiety in Germany, would be a 
source of great strength for England. It would not, how- 
ever, be a source of strength for France." 

They might reflect that those who would stand to suffer 
most in an Anglo-French-German war would — the chances 
are ninety-nine to one — not be ourselves, nor the Germans, 
•but the French. The chances that English soil would be 
violated and that we would be driven to defending our 
homes and hearths are appreciably less than in the case of 
either Frenchmen or Germans.^ And, reflecting upon these 
things, they would be led to inquire whether, in point of 
accuracy, it is not a fact that many of the clearest-headed 
men at the head of affairs in, or prominent in the councils 
•of, France are strongly in favour of a permanent under- 
standing with Germany, that the sore of Alsace-Lorraine 
is gradually healing with the up-growths of the new genera- 
tion, and that the process has been assisted by the Kaiser's 
•recent statesmanlike action in granting self-government 
to those annexed provinces — one of which, at least, has 
always bpen more German than French. In this connec- 
tion an article by M. Hanotaux — the ex-Minister for 
Foreign Affairs and distinguished historical student — in 
La Revue Hebdomadaire is worthy of note. After 
repudiating the charge that he is opposed to friendly 
relations with England, he declares himself — 
■*' a convinced partisan of the policy of 'equilibrium/; I 
demand that France shall make it her business as far as 
possible to hold the ' balance even ' between the Great 
Powers." 

1 If those who in this country speak so light-heartedly of war had 
"experienced in their persons the anguish of belonging to an invaded 
nation, they would call a very different tune. It is so easy to stir up 
strife from the depths of an editorial chair— so easy, and yet of all 
tforais of cowardice there is none, surely, so contemptible. 



176 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

Was it France's interest, he asks, in regard to recent 
events — 

** to throw our sword violently into the balance of Euro- 
pean quarrels when there was still need for us to proceed 
with the greatest circumspection in order to complete in 
Africa what had been undertaken — that is the question. 
After having pursued without success the chimera of the 
ring-fence (encerclement)} we have had to abandon it, 
and we find ourselves confronted with the painful reality 
which compels us to cede the Congo^ in exchange for a 
diminished Morocco." 

M. Hanotaux echoes, for France, as a Frenchman, 
the sentiment I venture to suggest here that Englishmen 
should give expression to when perpetually reminded that 
we must think of France and French interests : ** Friends 
with England" — he says — "very well. But France 
first," and he recommends the adoption, for France, of 
the policy here urged in these pages for Britain — 

*' If it be question of Germany, I should ask that France 
shall keep her hands free, that she shall act always in 
accordance with her duty and her actual and permanent 
interests, fearing nothing, forgetting nothing; but that 
French diplomacy shall always and everywhere work, 
according to circumstances, for the greatest profit of the 
present and for the best preparation for the future." 

Precisely. Let Britain do the same, rejecting Sir 
Edward Grey's formula that such a policy would leave 

l/.e the policy of making a ring-fence around Germany which 
Germans have alleged to be Britain's object since Sir Edward Grey'& 
accession to office, but which Sir Edward Grey has denied. That M. 
Hanotaux does not stand alorie, however, is notorious. Another very 
distinguished Frenchman of international reputation, but belonging to 
a totally different political school. Baron d'Estournelles de Constant, 
gave expression to the same belief in the Senate on February 6th last. 
After denouncing as absurd the idea that Germany could adopt a line 
of action in international affairs which- would place her morally in the 
rear of other nations, and pointing to her willingness to submit any 
cause of dispute arising out of the Convention of November 4, 191 1, 
to the Hague tribunal as the best answer to the allegation, Baron 
d'Estournelles de Constant added — 

"And here appears the puerile character of our policy of the 
isolation of Germany substituted for the irreproachable policy of 
equilibrium and of truth which ought to be the policy of France." 

2 That, of course, is an exaggeration. The French have not ceded 
'* the Congo " or anything approximately to its total area. 



" FRIENDSHIPS?" 177 

us "without a friend in Europe." "Friendships"" 
which fetter a nation's freedom are unnatural compacts 
and the most dangerous of illusions. 

Englishmen will not fail to perceive in the narrative of 
the events of last year a steady tendency in French official 
circles to draw nearer to Germany, and to bring a long- 
festering squabble (a sentiment which took into account 
the existence of a strong and legally unassailable German 
case) to a satisfactory solution. And they will, perchance,, 
not dissociate the attacks indulged in in certain quarters 
here against the men who in France were working for 
that end,^ and the proportionate sympathy expressed for 
those who were pulling in another direction, from the 
existence of sentiments among a section of thought at 
home which contemplates such a rapprochement with ill- 
disguised irritation. If they are at all affected by these 
observations. Englishmen will conclude that Britain's true 
role, the one responding alike to her real interests and ta 
the professions of her public men^ is to, use her influence 
not to impede, but, should she be required to use it at all 
one way or another, to facilitate a thorough reconciliation 
between France and Germany. 

The third key is to be sought in a serious effort at 
comprehension of both the difficulties and the necessities 

1 As a specimen of these attacks the article entitled "The New 
French Ministry " in the Spectator of January 20 last may be cited. 
In perusing it the reader will do well to bear in mind that, with one 
exception — that of M. de Selves, who had precedently quarrelled with 
his chief and resigned — the whole of M. Caillaux's colleagues (includ- 
ing M. Delcass6) spontaneously signed a public declaration immedi- 
ately upon the fall of the Caillaux Cabinet, in which they asserted 
that M. Caillaux had not acted without consulting them, and that 
they were in full agreement with everything he had done. And yet 
the Spectator holds up M. Caillaux to execration, and goes far towards- 
insinuating that he was a traitor to his country, unconscious,, 
apparently, that in so doing it labels an entire French Government 
with the same stigma, and not only one French Government but 
three, because M. Caillaux, whatever may have been his mistakes, 
was merely carrying out, with more courage and consistency, the 
policy of his two predecessors (MM. Briand and Monis ; vide 
Chapter XVI, ). When will Englishmen realise the grotesqueness of 
this kind of history-making which they are asked to swallow? The- 
article touches the sublime in its concluding paragraph when French 
public opinion is adjured to show " no mercy " to wicked Ministers 
who conceal their designs, well knowing that M. Delcass^ has been 
in this respect the greatest offender the Third Republic has known — 
M. Delcass6, for whom the Spectator has nothing but rhetorical 
flowers. 



178 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

which confront German statesmen and the German people. 
Such an effort is surely not incompatible with a fixed 
and unvarying- determination that, come what may, no 
decrease of the British fleet below the level of safety, can 
for one moment be entertained?^ The analogy the anti- 
German party at home seeks to draw between the France 
of Napoleon ist and industrial modern Germany, in order 
to make our flesh creep, must strike any one who tries to 
think it out, as even more comical than it is foolish. The 
France of a hundred years ago, drunk with military glory, 
at the feet of a military genius whose god was War and 
whose personal ambition was at once limitless, and un- 
controllable by any force within France, bears as much 
resemblance in its motives, its needs, and its possibilities to 
the Germany of to-day as . . . well as the two most 
dissimilar objects which the reader's mind can conjure. 

Germany's supreme need to-day is not war but peace, 
is not military conquest but trade, is not the acquisition 
of colonies peopled by a German-speaking race, but 
markets. The extension of trade, the extension of markets 
to feed an enormously expanding home industry, outcome 
of a yearly increase in population equal to the combined 
yearly increase of the United Kingdom, Austria-Hungary, 
and Italy — these are matters of life and death to Germany. 
A fair and open commercial field in every undeveloped 
area of the world's surface is a vital national necessity for 
Germany. The closing of potential markets to her trade 



1 This, however, does not imply that the nation should fail to 
guard itself against a recurrence of the unworthy panics which con- 
vulsed it in 1908 and 1909 — panics as Captain Burgoyne, the editor of 
the Navy League Annual, who describes himself as "a hardened 
Tory, an enthusiastic Navy Leaguer, and an ardent (if imperfect) 
advocate of an all-powerful and ultra-efficient fleet," and who may 
be assumed to know what he is talking about, describes as being built 
"upon the flimsiest foundation," The agitation at that time this 
enthusiastic advocate of an all-powerful British navy declares to have 
been " one of the most portentous pieces of parliamentary humbug 
ever practised upon the electorate." It may be that Captain Bur- 
goyne 's political views are inclined to tinge his indictment of the 
Prime Minister and Sir Edward Grey and Mr. McKenna, but the 
tables and statements with which he supports it are impressive, and 
I am not aware that their accuracy has been challenged. (See *' The 
Dreadnought Controversy " in the Oxford and Cambridge Review.) 
Unless Captain Burgoyne can be proved wrong in his facts the ordi- 
nary citizen will be forced to the double conclusion that, as in the 
Morocco controversy, he has been badly misled, and that the German 
Government has been much misrepresented. 



INACCURATE SIMILITUDES 179 

m Africa, in Asia, in South America, Germany is bound to 
regard as a blow aimed straight at her heart. She cannot 
help herself. Either she must find work at home to do for 
her rapidly increasing population or she must be content m 
see that population emigrating en masse to foreign lands 
over-seas. To find her people in work, she not only requires 
expanding markets in which to sell her goods, but she 
requires the raw material of the tropics and sub-tropics to 
sustain her industries and manufactures. Moreover, she 
must feed her people too, and she is no longer able to do 
that from her own soil's output. Owing, on the one hand 
to growth of population, and on the other to the current 
which, as in our case, is sweeping the people from the land 
into the towns, aggravated in the case of Germany by the 
political and social disadvantages under which the rural 
population, or at least a considerable section of it, suffers 
by comparison with the urban population, Germany is 
becoming increasingly less able to support her own people 
with the products of her own agriculture. These national 
necessities automatically entail both a constant and grow- 
ing addition to German shipping, and the necessity of 
adequate protection for that shipping on the high seas. 

The guiding motive of German foreign policy to-day 
iis to secure for the German people unfettered access to 
markets over-seas, as large a share as possible in the 
development of those markets, and a voice in the 
acquisition of over-sea territories which may fall, through 
the course of events, into the international melting-pot. 
It is not land hunger, but trade hunger which inspires her, 
and trade hunger responds to the fundamental demand of 
her national existence. That is the bed-rock reason why 
Germany opposed the secret partition of Morocco between 
France and Spain, when she got to . know of it. That 
is why Germany stood out pertinaciously for her acquired 
and her legal rights, and insisted that if f'rance was to get 
Morocco it should only be at a price (in which she did but 
follow the lead of Italy, Britain, and Spain), and on the 
understanding that Morocco should not be turned into a 
preserve for the French financier and concessionaire. 
That is why she exacted a price from Russia in exchange 
for standing aside while Russia — with Britain looking 
helplessly on — proceeded to absorb the largest and com- 
mercially most valuable section of Persia preparatory, so 
the Novoe Vremya is good enough to inform us, to the 
absorption of the whole. That is why Germany will fight 



i8o TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

against any attempt to close the Chinese markets in favour 
of any particular Power, or group of Powers. That is why 
Germany insisted last autumn that if Belgian rule in the 
Congo should ultimately become impossible^ France must 
so far modify her reversionary claim to the Congo State 
as to consent to the problem being carried before the 
Signatory Powers which created the Congo State. That 
is why Germany will find it impossible to allow that her 
newly-secured territory in the French Congo, or that the 
French Congo outside that territory and subject to the 
freedom of trade clauses of the Berlin Act, shall remain 
a vast rubber monopoly for the benefit of a handful of 
French and Belgian concessionaires. That is why, if the 
Portuguese West and East African dependencies come into 
the market she will demand her share. 

But, to carry out this necessity of her national life, 
Germany must be secure of such a position in the councils 
of the nations as to make her ever and always a factor 
to be reckoned with. This she can only attain by the 
possession of a fleet which will make the strongest Power 
hesitate either to attack her or to ignore her. People who- 
persist in representing the German fleet as built for purely 
aggressive purposes, pointing to Germany's great army 
as sufficient to secure her safety, altogether overlook the 
fact that if Germany is still, as ever, compelled to protect 
her land frontiers and maintain her position in Europe, the 
old Germany of continental-limited interests has passed 
away, and has been replaced by a Germany whose national 
existence is equally bound up with her over-seas commerce 
and industry, which have largely become the life-blood of 
the nation :^ - 

Germany's naval armaments will expand and contract 
in the measure in which her national needs are, or are 
not, regarded by Britain as a cause for blocking action. 
The matter is largely in our own hands. It is a matter of 
general policy. For example, it is perfectly obvious that 
Germany must have coaling and repair stations at some 
point or points over-seas. She is so situated to-day that, 
even under easy steam, she would be unable to reach her 

1 This chapter was written before Mr. Winston Churchill described 
the German navy as a *' luxury." It seems a pity that some of our 
governing statesmen do not take the trouble to make themselves 
acquainted with the elementary national problems of the countries 
they refer to. 



INEVITABLE GERMAN GROWTH i8i 

possessions in the Pacific in case of war. That is an 
intolerable position for any great Power to submit to in 
perpetuity. Is it reasonable, is it just, that we should for 
•ever oppose Germany's acquisition of coaling- stations on 
the high seas? Yet it is well known that we have been 
^o opposing her. A few years ago the Foreign Office was 
convulsed at the idea of a German purchase of one of the 
Canary Islands. If to-morrow there were a question of 
Germany's buying the Azores, we should have half the 
Press of Great Britain asserting that the purchase would 
sound the death-knell of the British Empire.^ Sir Edward 
'Grey was appalled at the phantom of a German naval base 
at Agadir, a mud-hole which would involve an expenditure 
of millions even to turn into a decent port, let alone a naval 
base. The Foreign Office was prepared to take immense 
risks in order to prevent Libreville falling into German 
hands. How much longer is this insane dog-in-the-manger 
policy to be pursued? 

The growth of modern Germany may be very incon- 
venient for us, but we have to make up our minds that it 
is inevitable, just as the increasing vigour of German 
industrial competition is inevitable. We have become so 
long accustomed to supremacy in the world of business, 
circumstances favoured us with such a tremendously long 
start, that the awakening is necessarily unwelcomed. 
But to credit the Germans with all sorts of Machiavellian 
designs is childish and undignified. We should be better 
employed in turning our Foreign and Colonial and Board 
of Trade Offices inside out; strengthening our Consular 
Service; publishing the reports of our Consuls broadcast, 
mstead of suppressing them ; effecting some much-needed 
changes in the representation of our diplomatic interests in 
certain foreign capitals ; making it part of the functions of 
our Embassies and Legations abroad to report upon all the,^ 
diplomatic and political aspects affecting trade problems ; 
infusing some new life into our Chambers of Commerce; 
correcting many of our antiquated methods of conducting 
trade abroad, and recognising that, in these days, com- 
merce must be treated as a science, and not merely as an 
•occupation. 

Nationally speaking, is there, for us, anything in the 
German national requirements, such as here defined, and, 

IWe should hiavfe had a month ago. 



i82 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

I believe, accurately defined, which threatens vital Britisht 

interests other than in the sense of keen commercial 
competition? If so, vi^hat? Does Germany close her 
over-sea dependencies to our trade? No. Does she 
impose differential tariffs therein in favour of her own, as 
the French and the Portuguese do? No. The British 
merchant and British trade are treated in German West 
and East Africa and in the Pacific on exactly the same 
equal footing- as we treat German merchants and trade in 
our oversea possessions. In her home market Germany's- 
fiscal policy and ours differ. Whether Germany's home 
fiscal policy is the best for Germany is a matter upon whicb 
opinion in Germany is divided, and judging from the recent 
elections is tending more and more towards free trade. But 
it is worthy to note that, in the main, the bitterest critics 
of Germany in Britain are precisely to be found among the 
supporters of a fiscal policy similar to that which they 
denounce Germany for practising, although France (be it 
said en passant) practises it also. But over-seas, Ger- 
many's commercial policy is like ours, the " open-door,'*" 
which she pursues and is bound to pursue in her own 
interests, it seems to me, wherever she acquires a politicaT 
footing, for the simple reason that, unlike France, Belgium 
and Portugal, she needs to find employment for the nation 
primarily, not profits for the favoured individual; i.e. she 
seeks an abundance of raw material from the tropics rather 
than large profits upon a smaller output — and that she can 
only get by a system of free commerce. That she can only 
get by making every brown and black man who acknow^ 
ledges her flag a richer man than he was before, inasmuch 
as the richer he is the more he will buy of her goods with 
the raw products of his soil. I contend that if Germany 
adheres to the policy of the open-door for trade over-seas, 
the national interest of Great Britain lies in the direction of 
not hampering her over-sea expansion in the undeveloped 
tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world in favour 
of a Power which closes the door; but rather in that of 
facilitating this expansion, assuming, of course, that our 
rulers mean what they say when they tell us that, save here 
and there, ^ we have got enough exotic territory on our 
hands already. 

1 Which means, of course, that they want Delagoa Bay and the 
Katanga, and are now more or less driven — alas ! for both honour 
»nd strategy — to absorb Southern Persia. 



CAN WE CRUSH GERMANY? 183. 

But if these conclusions are contested, what is the- 
alternative? Does any thinking Briton really believe that 
we can suppress Germany, that we can stop the works of 
that mighty human engine, arrest the flow of that rising 
population, contain its development to strictly circum- 
scribed limits, smash or crush nearly seventy million people 
by a successful war? A successful war would not be the 
end but the beginning of a legacy of hatred — of which no- 
man could estimate the final reckoning. If the German 
fleet were hopelessly shattered, what would the patriotic 
German say? Why, that it was his own fault. He did not 
build enough, he would argue, and he would promptly, 
tirelessly set to work to build another navy in its place — 
if he had to go without beer and sausages. If it comes to- 
France or Germany as an ally of Great Britain, look at the 
potentialities of each as a world-force, and let us beware- 
of backing the wrong horse. But it should be neither. Let . 
us, on the contrary, keep our hands free, unfettered by 
alliances or understandings of a compromising character 
from which our partners may profit but from which, as- 
John Bright said long ago, we stand in the long run to lose ; 
and let us come back to the only sound ideal of policy 
for Great Britain at the opening of the twentieth century,. 
i.e. to play our own part in the Concert of Europe when, 
necessity arises ; to uphold, if necessary by our whole 
strength, international treaties when violated to the detri- 
ment either of our honour or of our interests, but not to- 
assert our intention of upholding them when neither our 
honour nor our interests are directly affected, especially if 
we do not mean to carry out our proclaimed intention ; to 
use our moral influence, which is enormous (so long as it 
is not compromised by such inconsistencies as querulously 
objecting to a breach of international etiquette one moment 
and participating in a similar breach the next), in favour of 
a just policy towards weaker peoples and coloured races 
which, in the ultimate resort, is wise as well as right; to 
draw nearer by some well-thought-out scheme of Imperial' 
partnerships in matters of defence and foreign policy to our 
great self-governing Dependencies. 

Let us not allow ourselves to be mentally confused by 
such arguments as Sir Edward Grey used the other day 
in order to turn criticism away from the policy with which- 
he has become identified, and which consisted in an 
attempt to represent the critics of that policy as being 
desirous of interfering here, there and everywhere, whereas- 



i84 TEN YEARS OF SECRET DIPLOMACY 

the gravamen of complaint is precisely the contrary, viz. : 
that he interfered, unnecessarily and unhappily, in the 
Franco-German dispute over Morocco, and that, having 
himself concluded a Treaty with Russia over Persia, he 
has shown himself unable to make Russia conform to that 
Treaty. 

Let us on the contrary, made wiser, perchance, by 
this Morocco affair, persist in demanding until we obtain 
it, some measure of effective national control over our own 
foreign policy. Let us hold out the hand of friendship to 
Germany, not ostentatiously, not by sacrificing in the 
remotest degree our self-respect, not by offering her absurd 
" concessions," but in a spirit of frank recognition that 
between our two nations there is neither sense, nor dignity, 
nor justice, in petty jealousy and unworthy recrimination. 
In a spirit of frank recognition that Germany's industrial 
progress does but demonstrate the need for renewed 
activities of our own in a field of honourable economic 
rivalry — that as she has learned from us, so may we have 
to learn from her. In a spirit of frank recognition that she 
is as fully entitled as we may be to make such naval pro- 
vision as her statesmen consider advisable, adequately to 
protect her extensive over-sea connections.^ In a spirit of 
determination that we shall allow no influences on our side, 
no personal prejudices or incitements to suspicion and mis- 
trust, to prevent a gradual but sure advance towards the 
re-establishment of those. harmonious relations which are 
alone worthy of two great peoples who have fought side 
by side on many a stricken field, who have never fought 
against each other, who come of the same stock, between 
whom association and history have forged innumerable 
links, whose respective prosperity and progress are indis- 
pensable to each other's welfare, and whose reconciliation 
would remove the mists of apprehension and uncertainty 
which weigh like a nightmare upon the world. 

1 According to the recently published edition of the Navy League's 
Annual, the relative British and German position is as follows :— 
Dreadnoughts in commission March, 191 1 : British 12, German 5. 
Pre-Dreadnoughts : British 40, German 20. Armoured cruisers : 
British 34, German 9. Smaller cruisers: British 96, German 41. 
First-class destroyers: British 61, German 18. Submarines (built 
and building:) British 83, German 36. 



[13] 



CHRONOLOGICAL PRECIS 



1880 

First international Convention over the affairs of 
Morocco, held at Madrid. Largely owing to German 
influence, the ** most favoured nation treatment " in the 
matter of trade is extended by Morocco to all nations. 

1889 

The Moorish Government sends an embassy to Berlin. 

1890 

The German Minister at Fez signs a commercial Treaty 
with Morocco for five years. The German Government 
informs the signatory Powers of the Madrid Convention 
that Germany will not ratify the Treaty if the Powers 
object. 

1891-2 

Lord Salisbury despatches a special Mission to 
Morocco, and in a letter of instructions to the British 
envoy, defines British policy as being aimed at the preserva- 
tion of the independence and territorial integrity of 
Morocco. The text of the draft commercial Treaty to be 
submitted to the Sultan by the British envoy is communi- 
cated by Lord Salisbury to the signatory Powers of the 
Madrid Convention and their support invited, seeing that 
Treaty " does not seek to secure the slightest privilege 
in favour of England." All the signatory Powers except 
France give their support. 

The British Mission at Fez is supported by the German 
and Italian Ministers. It fails owing to French intrigue. 
Its failure is heralded in the French Press as a triumph of 
French diplomacy. 

1 894- 1 900 

Outward quiescence in Moroccan affairs, but the years 
1899-1900 marked by increasing tension between the 
Algerian (French) Government and the Moorish Govern- 
ment in relation to "frontier incidents." 



186 



. I 



igoi 

April. French annexation of the Tuat, Igli and Zusfana oases 

over which Morocco exercised a shadowy sovereignty. 
Increased Franco-Moorish tension. 

July. The Sultan sends a mission to Paris. M. Delcass^, 

French Foreign Minister, receives it. A " Protocol "is 
signed in which the French Government declares its 
respect for the integrity of Morocco. ^ ^ 

June-July. M. Delcass^ opens secret negotiations with Spain for a 
Franco-Spanish division of Morocco. 

1902 

April. M. Delcass^ signs a further agreement with Morocco 

in which both Governments promise one another ** dual 
and mutual support " in dealing with raiding bands in the 
undetermined regions bordering their common frontiers. 

Jan. -Sept. M. Delcass^'s secret negotiations with Spain continue. 
M. Delcass^ promises France's " diplomatic support " in 
the event of objections by a third Power (England). In 
September the Franco-Spanish Treaty assumes its final 
shape. ' 

December. In December the Spanish Premier resigns and his suc- 
cessor declines to ratify the Treaty, owing to British 
diplomatic representations (revealed in November, 191 1). 



1903 

May. The President of the French Republic visits Algiers 

whither the Sultan of Morocco despatches a special mission 

to meet him. 

Increasing demands by the French Colonial Party in 

Paris and by the Algerian Government for '* energetic 

action "' in Morocco. 
November. The Sultan of Morocco begins contracting loans upon 

the French market. 



1904 

April. General settlement of outstanding questions between 

France and Great Britain. 

April. Publication of a general Anglo-French Declaration 

regarding Egypt and Morocco, in which the French 
Government declares that it has no intention ** of altering 
the political status of Morocco." 

October, Publication of a Franco-Spanish Declaration regarding 

Morocco, in which both Governments declare themselves 
"firmly attached to the integrity of Morocco. " 

April. Conclusion of a secret understanding between Britain 

and France, in which the British Government postulates 
that Mediterranean Morocco shall fall to Spain in certain 
eventualities. (Revealed in November, 191 1.) 

X87 



October. Conclusion ot a secret understanding approved by the 

. ' British Government between France and Spain prefiguring 

the division of Morocco into French and Spanish spheres 

of political and economic action (revealed in November, 

1911). 

A French Syndicate takes over the Moorish loan and 
Morocco contracts a total debt of ;^2,5oo,ooo towards 
certain French banking establishments. 

March. M. Delcass^ assures the German Ambassador at Paris 

. that France desires to "uphold the existing political and 

^--' territorial status " of Morocco. 

March. The North German Gazette (the official organ of the 

German Government) declares that, in view of the 
" reiterated assurances " of the French Government that 
France had no territorial designs upon Morocco, German 
interests, "so far as can be gathered at the moment," 
are in no jeopardy from the Anglo-French negotiations, of 
which news has been in circulation, 

April. Prince Biilow, the German Chancellor, being questioned 

in the Reichstag on the Anglo-French public Declaration, 
three days after its publication, declares that he had no 
official notification of it, but that he had no reason to 
believe it is directed against Germany, which has 
commercial interests in Morocco, and will protect them. 

October- Reuter's Agency in Paris declares that every detail of 

the Franco-Spanish negotiations has been made known to 
the j^ritish Government, that the terms of the Treaty are 
regarded with satisfaction by the French, Spanish, and 
British Governments, and that it contains a number of 
secret clauses which will not be made public. 

October. Le Temps publishes an interview with M. Etienne, the 

leader of the French Colonial Party, in which the existence 
of secret clauses receives further corroboration. 

M. Delcass6 presents a formidable series of reforms to 
the Sultan of Morocco. Growing alarm of the Moorish 
Government at French designs. 

1905 

March. The German Emperor 1 calls at Tangier and declares 

to the Sultan's representatives that he intends to safeguard 
German interests in Morocco, and that he looks upon the 
Sultan as an " absolutely independent Sovereign." 

April. Explosion of Anger in the Fr.ench and British Press. 

April. The Sultan of Morocco rejects French reform scheme. 

April-June. German diplomacy presses for a renewed International 
Conference on the affairs of Morocco following the prece- 
dent of the Madrid Convention. 

M. Delcass^ does not officially notify Germany of the 
conclusion of the arrangement with Britain. 

M. Delcass^ does not officially notify Germany of the 
Franco-Spanish arrangement. 

April-June. M. Delcass6 and the British Foreign Office oppose 
International Conference. 

1 Acting upon the advice of Prince Biilow. 

(Imperial Germany, Cassell.) 



188 



April-June. The Times adopts an attitude of extreme violence 
towards Germany, and denounces all idea of a Conference. 
It declares that the Moroccan question was settled in 1904, 
and that another Conference would be a *' capitulation '* 
and *' humiliation " for England and France. 

June. The British Foreign Office informs the Sultan that 

Britain will be no party to a Conference. 

June, M. Delcass^ resists a Conference, which the French 

Premier, M. Rouvier, and M. Delcass^'s other colleagues 
favour. M. Delcass6 resigns. 

June. The Times represents M. Delcass^'s resignation as 

having been demanded by Germany. 

July. M. Delcass6, soon after his fall, is interviewed by Le 

Gaulois and foreshadows the annihilation of Germany's 
ports, trade, and mercantile marine through an Anglo- 
French naval coalition. 

October. Le Matin publishes a statement purporting to be an 

account of the last meeting of the French Cabinet before 
M. Delcass^'s resignation, in the course of which the latter 
is said to have informed his colleagues that, in the event 
of a Franco-German rupture, Britain had undertaken to 
mobilise her fleet, seize the Kiel Canal, and land 100,000 
men in Schleswig-Holstein. 

October. M. Jaures, leader of the Socialist Party in France, 

affirms the general accuracy of the revelations in Le Matin. 
Year closes with Anglo-German relations much 
embittered. 

190b 

February. Opening of International Conference at Algeciras 
attended by Moorish representatives. The Conference 
draws up an "Act," "in the name of God Almighty," 
and " based upon the threefold principle of the sovereignty 
and independence of His Majesty the Sultan, the integrity 
of his dominions, and economic liberty without any 
inequality." 

The concluding Article of the Act provides that : 
" All existing Treaties, Conventions, and arrangements 
between the signatory Powers and Morocco remain in force. 
It is, however, agreed that in case their provisions be found 
to conflict with those of the present General Act, the 
stipulations of the latter shall prevail." 
June. The Sultan ratifies the Act. 



1907 



March. French occupation of Udja (Moorish territory) in 

punishment of the murder of a French subject. Promises 

of withdrawal not kept. 
March. M. Pichbn, French Foreign Minister, denies that the 

occupation of Udja is " a step towards Fez." 
September. Franco-Spanish Syndicate, in the course of constructing 

a railway at Casablanca, desecrates a Moorish cemetery ; 

collision with populace, several European workmen killed ; 

Casablanca bombarded by French, many thousands of 

Moors killed. 



Permanent occupation by French of Casablanca, Rabat, 

and, by degrees, of the whole of the Shawiya district. 
November. French Chamber votes an Order of the Day disclaiming 

an intention of interfering in the internal affairs of 

Morocco. 
November. France presents the Moorish Government with an 

indemnity bill of ;^2, 400,000. 

1908 

January. Outburst of Moorish fury against Abdulaziz the Sultan 

Mulai-Hafid proclaimed Sultan. 
January. French Chamber disclaims any intention of interfering 

in the internal affairs of Morocco, and proclaims France's 

intention to observe the Algeciras Act. 
June. French Chamber again registers intention to observe 

Algeciras Act. 
December. French Chamber again registers intention to observe 

Algeciras Act. 

1909 

January. French Chamber repeats intention to observe Algeciras 

Act. 

February. Franco-German Declaration respecting Morocco, 
France therein declares herself " firmly attached to the 
maintenance of the independence and integrity of 
Morocco. " 

Franco-German discussions as to joint economic enter- 
prises in Morocco and elsewhere continue. 

November. French Chamber registers once more intention to 
observe Algeciras Act. 

1910 

Fresh inroads of international finance into Morocco. 
By the close of 1910 Morocco's indebtedness to Europe is 
;^6,520,ooo. Moorish customs and virtually all other 
sources of local revenue mortgaged to meet interest. 

Franco-German colonial " conversations " continue. 

Mulai-Hafid, unable to raise revenue from ordinary 
sources, indulges in many cruel exactions. Condition of 
Morocco becomes chaotic. 

1911 

Jan. -June. Franco-German discussions continue. 

January. Preliminary Franco-German Agreement of December, 

1910, dropped by Briand Cabinet. 
February. Franco-German Agreement revived by M. Briand on a 

new basis. 
February. New Agreement signed. 
February. Fall of Briand Cabinet. 
March. Monis Cabinet repudiates Agreement. 

March. French Chamber declares its intention of upholding the 

Algeciras Act. 



190 



April. Fez reported blocked by insurgents 

May. General Moinier starts for its relief at the head of 

30,000 men. 

May. Germany informs France that she (Germany) reserves 

to herself complete liberty of action in view of altered 
status in Morocco. 

May. Sir E. Grey publicly approves of French march on Fez. 

June. Fez relieved. French troops remain in occupation. 

June. Spain, disbelieving French disinterestedness, and fearful 

of losing her advantages under the secret Convention, pours 
troops into the Riff, and answers the occupation of Fez by 
occupying Larash and El-Kasr. 

June. Monis Cabinet falls. 

June. Fierce attacks upon Spain in French Press. 

June. 100,000 French and Spanish troops in Morocco. 

Authority of Moroccan Government entirely disappears. 

June. Stale-mate in Franco-German Colonial Conversations. 

July. Germany sends Panther to Agadir. Advises Powers. 

July. Outcry against Germany in British Press headed by the 

Times. Opinion in France not so pronouncedly hostile. 

July 4. French Foreign Minister leaves Paris for Holland with 

the President of the French Republic on an official visit. 

July 4. Sir Edward Grey adopts strong pro-French attitude, and 

insists that British Government must be a party to any 
Franco-German discussions. 

July 9. Negotiations opened between the German and French 

Governments. 

July 20. Times announces that Germany is making unfair 

demands upon France for compensation in equatorial Africa 
and declares that no British Government can tolerate these 
demands even if a French Government were feeble enough 
to sanction them ; presses for the despatch of British men 
of war to Agadir. 

July 21. Sir Edward Grey sends for German Ambassador, and, 

after saying that Germany appeared to be making impos- 
sible demands upon France, hints that it may be necessary 
to take steps to protect British interests. German 
Ambassador protests Germany has made no such demands, 
and that she has not the least intention of injuring British 
interests. 

July 21. Mr. Lloyd George makes a threatening speech at the 

Mansion House. 

July 22. The Times emphasises the anti-German character of 

Mr. Lloyd George's speech, and compares Germany to Dick 
Turpin. 

November. The Paris Press discloses the secret Anglo-Franco- 
Spanish arrangements concluded in 1904. 

November. Franco-German Agreement. 

Nov. -Dec. Revelations by Captain Faber, M.P., and others that 
the British Government was prepared to lend military and 
naval aid to France in the event of a Franco-German 
rupture. Qualified denial by British Foreign Office. 

Year closes with Anglo-German friction poisoning the 
international atmosphere. 



191 



INDEX 



Agadir: Chs. VL, XVII., XVIIL, XIX., XXL. XXV. 
Algeciras, Act of, Ch. II. 

nature and provisions of, Ch. VI. 

crucial article of, Ch. VI I. 

characterised in French Parliamentary Report, Ch VII. (foof- 

note.) 
violation of, by France, Chs. VII., XVII. 
violation of, by Spain, Chs. VII., XVII. 
origin of, Ch. XVI. 

Anglo-German Relations, how affected by Morocco dispute. Intro- 
duction. 

B 

British People, how essential knowledge has been withheld from- 
them. Introduction, Ch. XIII. 
how misled as to French and German policy, Chs. X. XIV 
XVII. 

necessity of insisting upon an honest diplomacy, Ch. XIII. 
evil consequences of being kept in the dark, Chs. XIII XV 

XVII., XXIII., XXV. 
sense of fair play, Ch. XIV, 

have not realised significance of Secret Treaties of 1904, Ch. XV.. 
Britain, policy in Morocco from 1892 to 1901, Ch. II. 

passive spectator of violation of Act of Algeciras, Ch. VI 1 1, 
prestige in Morocco, Ch. IX. 

attitude towards M. Delcass^'s secret negotiations with Spain. 
1900 to 1903, Ch. X. 
public and secret arrangements with France, Ch. XI. 
connection with secret France-Spanish Convention, Ch. XII. 

193 



INDEX 

gains and losses under the 1904 Treaties, Ch. XIII. 
policy which should have been followed after Algeciras, Ch. XIII. 
attacks upon Germany and her Emperor, Ch. XV. 
©RiTAiN declines to attend Conference, Ch. XV. 

alleged willingness to support France in war with Germany in 

1905, Ch. XVI., and in 191 1, Ch. XXL, and Introduction, 
support of French expedition to Fez, Ch. XVII. 
attitude towards Germany's demonstrations at Agadir, Chs. XIX., 

XX., XXL, XXII. 
demands to take part in Franco-German negotiations, Ch. XIX. 
policy towards Germany, Ch. XXV. 
British Interests, how neglected under the 1904 Declaration, Chs. 

XL, XXIV. 
how affected by relations with France and Germany, Ch. XXV. 
how affected by secret diplomacy, Ch. XXV. 

D 

Delcasse, M., his policy "towards Morocco in 1901, Chs. III., IV., V., 
IX., X. 
his policy towards Italy, Ch. X. 
his policy towards Spain, Ch. X. 
conversation with Prince Radolin, Ch. XIV. 
treatment of Germany, Ch. XV. 
threats against Germany, Ch. XVI. 
conceals secret Treaties from his colleagues, Ch. XV. 
real reason of his fall, Ch. XVI. 

Deschanel, M. Paul, view of German policy in Morocco, Ch. V. 

Diplomacy, immorality of 1904 secret Treaties, Chs. XL, XIII. 

the British diplbmatic machine, Chs. XV., XXL, XXII. 

and public opinion, Chs. XXII. XXV. 
Diplomacy, Secret, cause of war of 1914, Preface. 

E 
Cuan-Smith, Sir Charles, his mission to Morocco, Chs. IL, IX. 



Franco-German Convention, of November 4, 1901. What it may 

mean, Introduction, Ch. XXIV. 
Franco-German Declaration of February, 1909, Ch. VI. 

194 



^ 



INDEX 

France, anti-kBritish intrigues in 1892, Ch. II. 
policy in Morocco until 1901, Ch. III. 
pledges as to preservation of independence and integrity of 

Morocco, Chs. VI., XL, XII., XIII., XVII. 
feelings of Morocco towards, Ch. IX. 
annexation of Tuat oases, Ch. IX. 
treaties with Morocco, Chs. III., IX. 
France, policy in Morocco, 1902-03, Ch. IX. 

attempt secretly to partition Morocco with Spain, Ch. X. 
arrangement with Britain, Ch. XL 

secret Convention with Spain partitioning Morocco, Ch. XIL 
gains and losses under 1904 Treaties, Ch. XIII. 
treatment of French people by their diplomatists, Ch, XIII. 
.general ignorance of Secret Treaties with Britain and Spain 

Chs. XV., XVII. 
• her treatment of Germany in 1905, Ch. XVI. 
character of French, Ch. XVL. 

irresponsible politicians and journalists in, Ch. XVI. 
policy in Morocco, 1904-05^ Ch. XVI. 
conflicting views in, as to policy in Morocco after Algecirab, 

Ch. XVII. 
condemnation of Secret Treaties, Chs. XV., XVII. 
Jthe expedition to Fez, Chs. XVII., XX. 
negotiations with Germany, 1909-11, Ch. XVIII. 
reception of news of Agadir demonstration, Ch. XVIII. 
character of French Colonial Party, Ch. XIX. 
negotiations with Germany over French Congo, Chs. XXL, XXII. 
what she has acquired under the Convention of November, 191 1. 

Ch. XXIV. 
policy towards Germany, Ch. XXV. 
Finance, operations of international in Morocco, Ch. VIII. 



CrREY, Sir Edward, his speech in the House of Commons, November 

27, 1911, Introduction, Chs. XX. to XXIV. 
ifailure to modify British official attitude after Algeciras, Chs. 

XIII., XVL 
.failure to foresee inevitable clash of Franco-German interests, 

Ch. XIX. 
.attitude from July i to July 13, 191 1, Chs. XX., XXII. 
.attitude from July 12 to July 21, Chs. XXL, XXII. 
attitude after July 21, Ch XXIII. 
.advice to nation, Ch. XXV. 

^95 



INDEX 

Germany, support of Sir C. Euan-Smith's mission, Chs. II., V^ 
straightforward action towards the Powers in igoo, Ch. V. 
early policy in Morocco, Ch. V. 
internal difficulties, Ch. V. 
first warning to France, Ch. V. 

financial and commercikl interests in Morocco, Ch. V. 
feelings of Moors towards, Chs. IX., XVII. 

first protest against secret Anglo-Franco-Spanish Treaties, Chv 
XV. 

Germany, first reception of Anglo-French (public) Declaration, Ch-.. 

XIV. 
Emperor's visit to Tangier, Ch. XV. 
presses for a Conference (1905), Ch. XV. 
justified in demanding a Conference, Ch. XVI. 
resentment at French and British treatment, Ch. XVI. 
her case in 1905, Ch. XVI. 
public declarations in 1905, Ch. XVI. 
alarm in, at the Stephen Lauzanne revelations, Ch. XVI. 
protest against violation of Algeciras Act, Ch. XVIII. 
despatches Panther to Agadir, Chs. I., XVIII., XIX. (foot-note.> 
was she justified? Ch. XVIII. 

her diplomatic methods and those of other Powers, Ch. XVI I !► 
did she desire war? Ch. XVIII. 
negotiations with France, 1909-1911,. Ch. XVIII. 
trouble with France in equatorial Africa, Ch, XVIII. 
conversations with Britain, July, 1911, Ch. XX. 
warnings to France in April, 1911, Ch. XX. 
her alleged demands in July, 191 1, Chs. XXI.-, XXII. 
willingness to recognise French Protectorate over Morocco, CIk 

XXII. 
what she has done for British trade, Ch. XXIV. 
what she has acquired under the Convention of November, 1911^ 

Ch. XXIV. 
general policy and national requirements, Ch. XXV. 

H 
Hay, Sir John Drummond, his policy in Morocco, Ch. II. 

L 

Lloyd Georgf, Mr., speech at Mansion House, Chs. XXI. » XX1IJ». 

.96 



INDEX 

X M 

Morocco, Sultan of, invitation to Powers to attend a Conference, 
Ch. VI. 
letter to him from the King of Italy, Ch. VI. 
extravagance of (Abdulaziz), Ch. VIII. 
debts of, Ch. VIII. 

refuses (Mulai Hafid) to agree to loan of 1910, Ch. VIII. 
yields to French threats, Ch. VIII. 
impoverishment and decay of authority of, Ch. VIII. 
resistance to French demands. Ch. XVI. 
capacity to restore order, Ch. XVII. 
ruin. Ch. XVII. 



P 

eanther. The, Chs. I., VI., VIII., XVIII., XIX. 



flosEBERY, Lord, his view of Anglo-French arrangement of 1904 
Ch. XI. 



Spain, her relation with and position in Morocco, prior to 1901, 
Ch. IV. 

violation of Act of Algeciras, Chs. VIII., XVII. 
secret negotiations with France ^a 1900-03, Ch. X. 
secret Convention with France, Ch. XII. 
cat's paw of British diplomacy, Ch. XIII. 
resentment at French attitude, Ch. XVII. 
disputes with France, Ch. XXIV. 



Treaties, public and secret, between Britain, France, and Spain, 
Introduction, Ch. XI. 
secret clauses of Anglo-French Declaration, Introduction, 

Ch. XVI. 
secret of Franco-Spanish Convention, when and how reached. 
Introduction. 

197 



INDEX 

Franco-Spanish public Declaration and secret Convention! 

analysed. Ch. XII. 
effect of (secret) Treaties upon national interests, Chs. XIIL 

XXIII. 

Franco-German Convention of November 4, 1911, analvsedx, 
Ch. XXIV. 

Times, its views as to French intrigues in 1892, Ch. IL 
attitude in 1905, Ch. XV. 
attitude in 191 1, Chs. XIX., XXL 



U 
Union Des Mines, Ch. XVIIL 



MANCHESTER : 
AT THE NATIONAL LABOUR PRESS, 
iVLSO- AT LONDON. 
26001 



U] 



EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS OF 
"MOROCCO IN DIPLOMACY." 

THE BRITISH PRESS. 

In the " Appeal from prejudice to reason " which concludes the book, 
we learn that there are three " keys " with which to unlock the door 
that separates us from Germany. . . . The second key is " the 
indispensable duty that devolves upon the House of Commons to 
understand the real nature of our relations with France." Here we 
are faced by the old difficulty. The disclosure which Mr. Morel asks 
for would be fatal to the object for which the understanding between 
the two Powers was entered into. — The Spectator. 

Few men in our day have in their sphere accomplished more effec- 
tive work for civilisation than Mr. E. D. Morel, whose recent book 
" Morocco in Diplomacy," now lies before us. The services rendered 
by him in exposing the shameful cruelty and exploitation of the Congo 
natives by the late King Leopold and his Red Rubber gang, as well as 
his vigilance and work in upholding the rights of native races in other 
parts of Africa and elsewhere in the world, have won for him a unique 
fame and the gratitude of all friends of humanity and freedom. His 
present book is a valuable contribution to the politics and history of 
present-day Imperialism. . . . The facts stated and the documents 
reprinted by Mr. Morel cannot be explained away. The book is 
avowedly written in the interests of creating a better understanding 
and feeling between this country and Germany, a circumstance which 
increases its interest to Socialist readers. It is temperately written and 
forms a powerful indictment of the policy of the British Foreign 
Office and an exposure of the turpitude and danger of secret diplomacy. 
— Socialist Review. 

Mr. Morel has never lacked courage in denouncing abuses, and the 
columns of the Times bear witness to the sympathy with which we 
have often supported his efforts. It is with all the more regret, there- 
fore, that while we highly approve the general object with which this 
book is written — namely, the promotion of better relations between 
this country and Germany — we find ourselves^ unable to accept his 
main contention or to agree with his reading of some of the more 
important facts of the diplomatic history of Morocco from 1880 to the 
present day. — The Times. 

This book should be in the hands of every Member of Parliament, 
every journalist whose duty it is to instruct public opinion, and every 
citizen who desires to form an independent judgment upon a very 
critical passage in the life of the English State. It is written with the 
lucidity and force of one of the most skilful publicists in the country • 
it is the fruit of extensive and thorough investigation ; and it presents 
a reading which is not the official and vulgar reading. — The Daily 
News. 



EXTRACT FROM PRESS NOTICES. 

An acute rdsum^ of a seven years' imbroglio which has more than 
once led the great nations to the very brink of war. Mr. Morel has 
had a task of the utmost difficulty, but he has unravelled the tangled 
skein of diplomatic activity with skill. — The Athenceum. 

There are a good many people, without doubt, who will disagree 
more or less violently with Mr. Morel's conclusions, but there can be 
not the slightest doubt of the ability with which he presents them, or 
of the skill with which he musters facts and figures to their support. 
And whether the reader agree or disagree, he will arise from a perusal 
of the book with an added knowledge of one of the greatest and most 
difficult of European problems, with much to think about and with 
new openings for profitable thought. — Newcastle Daily Chronicle. 

Mr Morel moves northward from the Congo and the Niger to 
Morocco. His business also is pacific, but he understands the 
Uehermesnch, and knows that war comes more of pride than of 
greed. Moreover, he believes in righteousness. So he tries to 
persuade Englishmen that Germans are not always and invariably in 
the wrong. — Church Times. • 

The book is a marvel of compression, and whatever one may- think 
of the conclusions a number of the premises are unassailable. It is 
not a book to be neglected. Events are piling up in a way which . . . 
makes it desirable that this book should be well and widely read. We 
may not agree with all its author's conclusions, but the mass of facts 
which he presents clearly and concisely will assist in forming the 
opinion that, after all, the Moroccan crisis was not ALL Germany's 
fault. — The Academy. 

It cannot, indeed, be said that any of the Powers concerned 
appears to advantage in the tale that Mr. Morel unfolds. There 
have been faults on all sides . . . Mr. Morel's narrative is instruc- 
tive as showing that the standing acquired by Germany in Morocco 
is no new matter, and that German influence has been persistently 
exercised in the direction of maintaining the principle of the open 
door. — Aberdeen Free Press. 

There is much in Mr. Morel's book to shock the man whose motto 
is "my country right or wrong," but as an expression of a wider 
tolerance in judging other nations, which we hope is gradually per- 
meating the public mind, it deserves to be widely read. — Methodist 
Times. 

One of the morals which the author desires to impress upon the 
British public is the danger of a system that makes it possible for 
those who operate the diplomatic machine to involve the nation in 
rash and costly enterprises, as to which they have no opportunity of 
expressing an opinion. — Nottingham Guardian. 

The author's views and arguments are so weighty, and he includes 
such a mass of material in support of them, that it is impossible to 
give more than the briefest outline of his purposes ; but we can say 
without hesitation that even if the British reader will not entirely 
allow himself to be convinced by Mr. Morel's dignified pages, and 
abandon altogether his cherished beliefs in the infallibility, wisdom 
and discretion of our Foreign Office, he will yet grant that there arc 
two sides to this important question, and that Germany's attitude 's 
as much justified as the fact that British and French diplomatic 
manoeuvres have not been devoid of blemish is obvious. — Western 
Morning News. , 



EXTRACT FROM PRESS NOTICES. 

Several points on which light is cast by Mr. Morel well deserve 
public attention. . . . Our Foreign Office, loyally devoted to the fetish 
" continuity of policy " and apparently the cat's paw of the Jingo party 
in France, plunged into the fray against Germany on motives 
infinitesimally small compared with the possible consequences, ^sop's 
fable of the dog which dropped the real bone to secure its reflection 
seems appropriate to some very distinguished statesmen. — Edinburgh 
Evening News. 

Mr. Morel is a trained observer. His " Red Rubber " exercised a 
distinct and powerful effect in this country. More recently his book 
on Nigeria has been read and appreciated. . . We desire no quarrel, 
and we desire the advent of a happier relationship than that which 
at present prevails with Germany, but we prefer to accept a view of 
the international situation accepted by the well-informed leaders on 
both sides in the British Parliament to that set forth by Mr. Morel, 
and the few who agree with him, that the British public has been 
deliberately misled by ignorance and duplicity of the British Foreign 
Office. . . The volume, however, is exceedingly useful as a record of 
events, and fo-- the valuable appendix it contains, and the maps illus- 
trative of the scope of the secret treaties. As was inevitable, Mr. 
Morel sets forth his case ably and well. — Dublin Daily Press, 

THE FRENCH PRESS. 

Le Temps — the organ of the French Foreign Office — in a three- 
column review (May 14, 1912) declared, in substance, that " Morocco 
in Diplomacy " was an effort to destroy the " entente cordiale," " at 
the very moment when the mission of the new German Ambassador, 
Baron Marshall von Bieberstein, to London is expressive of an 
official German attempt to approach the British Government." This 
view was successively developed in further issues of that journal. 

The book is a tissue of the basest calumnies. . . Mr. Morel is the 
unofficial agent of Baron Marshall von Bieberstein. . . . He is 
endeavouring to mislead his countrymen to please the merchants of 
Hamburg. . . He makes a parade of morality and invokes the 
lowest passions of the human mind. . . . British opinion is too sen- 
sible to let itself be moved by the author's equivocations, lies, and 
hypocrisies. — La Depeche Coloniale (organ of the French Colonial 
Party). 

From the literary point of view we have nothing but praise tor Mr, 
Morel's book, which is written in a lucid style, compiled on a well- 
constructed scheme and supported by serious and powerful arguments. 
— La Nouvelle Revue. 

The human value of Mr. Morel's personality is a reason for care- 
fully listening to his testimony even if we do not accept all his 
conclusions. . . . With these reserves it is necessary to state that the 
spirit which inspires Mr. Morel's book is neither anti-French nor pro- 
German — as has been said by some French newspapers — but simply 
pacifist and, in the true sense of the term, internationalist. He is not 
campaigning against the entente cordiale — of which he was one of the 
firmest partisans when to be so required some courage in the Fashoda 
days. But he protests against the transformation of this friendly 
understanding into a warlike alliance directed against Germany. He 
desires that the fpendly feeling between France and England should 



EXTRACT FROM PRESS NOTICES. 

duplicate itself by the establishment of a friendly feeling between 
England and Germany, and that English diplomacy, instead of work- 
ing against an improvement in Franco-German relations, should, on 
the contrary, endeavour to assist a Franco-German reconciliation. 
That would, indeed, be serving the interests of the British, French 
and German peoples against unscrupulous minorities and, especially, 
against the armament rings. All apostles of peace and of inter- 
national justice must thank Mr. Morel for what he has written. — 
La Revue du Mots. 

THE GERMAN PRESS. 

" Let us stretch ou,t the hand of friendship to Germany," Morel 
says. These words undoubtedly spring from deep conviction. . . We 
know that Morel does not stand alone, and if we are rightly informed 
Sir E. Grey is now really engaged in seeking those paths which may 
lead to an understanding with Germany. — Kreuz Zeitung. 

Morel exhibits a sincere endeavour to awaken among his readers 
an understanding for a purely objective view of the antagonism 
between England and Germany, a view such as is held among steady- 
thinking politicians in Germany, because it is his conviction that when 
thus viewed the antagonism is not insuperable. . . . Such a fair and 
unimpassioned pronouncement, which is impressed with the true love 
of peace, and is capable of attributing honourable motives even to 
one's opponents, is rarely met with in England — or in Germany. . . . 
May this appeal, spoken with an upright heart, meet with that 
response on both sides of the North Sea which it certainly deserves. 
-^Berliner Tageblatt. 

THE SWISS PRESS. 

With courageous frankness Morel acknowledges that injustice was 
done to Germany, that she was credited with intentions she never 
had. He goes still further and shows that the famous assertion of 
Mr. Churchill that a strong navy is a " luxury " for Germany is 
devoid of reason, because the mighty expansion of German population 
and industry can no longer be kept back, but must for good or evil 
be recognised and taken into account by England ; that this expan- 
sion cannot even be prevented by a victorious war, and that Germany 
is not unjustified in desiring not only a strong navy but coaling 
stations over seas. — Easier Nachrichten (Basle). 

Mr. E. D. Morel is well known to the people of Geneva. He 
came here some time ago, and pleaded for the natives of the Congo 
with a warmth and an eloquence which greatly moved his audience. 
Here he trenches upon different ground. . . . His intentions are 
laudable, but we think that many of his conclusions are debatable. 
— Journal de Geneve (Geneva). 

This impartial and unprejudiced view of the Morocco question is 
most welcome. . . . The conclusion which must be drawn from the 
material of irrefutable facts put forward by Morel is that it was not 
Germany which light-heartedly brought Europe to the verge of 
war. ... If tha author succeeds in spreading this impression in 
wider circles, his work will undoubtedly contribute to smoothing the 
path towards better reactions between the two countries. — Vaterland 
(Lucerne). 



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